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QDJECTIOnS 



BY 



l3. Oarradinej I^.D. 



SYRACUSE, N. Y 
A. W. HALL, 
PUBLISHER. 
1802. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



UNITKI) STATES OF AMEKICA. 



CHURCH 



ENTERTAINMENTS: 



Twenty Objections. 

REV. B. CAERADINE, D.D. 



C JAN 15 189? I 



iAN 15 189? 
2. 



SYRACUSE, N. Y. 

A. W. HALL, Publisher. 

1891. 






COPYKIGHT, 1'891, 
BY 

A. W. Hah.. 



CHUKCH 



ENTERTAINMENTS 



Twenty Objections. 



BY 

EEY. B. CARRADINE, D.D, 



SYRACUSE, N. Y. 

A. W. HALL, Publisher. 

1891. 



J 



The Library 
OF Congress 

WASHINGTON 



Copyright, 1891, 

BY 

A. W. Hall. 



Church Entertainments. 



TWENTY OBJECTIONS. 



There are two scenes in the Bible that have 
always made a profound impression on me. 
One is the cleansing of the Temple by the 
Son of God. What an obstinate Temple it 
was in some respects ! and what a faculty it 
had of accumulating questionable things ! At 
one time back in the days of the Kings we read 
of so many hundreds of cart-loads of rubbish 
taken from it. In the time of Christ it was 
cleansed twice; once at the beginning of his 
ministry, and again at its close. The Script- 
ures tell us that the Savior spent an entire day 
looking upon the human innovations and cor- 
ruptions of the Temple. What thoughts must 
have dwelt in his mind, what grief must have 
swelled his heart, as he marked the long lines 



CHURCH EjN^TERTAIKMEKTS. 



of bleating animals, the coops and cages of flut- 
tering birds, and listened to the rattle of coins 
on tables accompanied by the excited chaffer- 
ing of hundreds of buyers and sellers ! And 
this was the Temple that God had solemnly con- 
secrated to himself ! This was the House of 
Prayer instituted by the Father ! Behold, it 
had become a bazaar or market-place ! Worse 
still, Christ called it a Den of Thieves. It was 
fouler now than when a thousand cart-loads of 

rubbish had been discovered in its sacred pre- 
cincts. Christ' s solemn, silent and prolonged 
view of the scene one day, and the occurrence 
that followed on the next day, when in holy in- 
dignation he drove out the animals, overturned 
the tables and cleansed the courts of the Tem- 
ple, teach most powerfully and unmistakably 
the jealousy with which God regards his house. 

The second scene in the Bible I call attention 
to is Christ sitting over against the Treasury 
of the Temple and watching the people as they 
cast in their gifts. He saw the rich contribute 
of their abundance, and he beheld among them 
a certain poor widow who threw in two mites 
— even all that she had. 

It would have seemed that the trying scenes 



TWENTY ^OBJECTIONS, 



4SOon to burst npon him, or the coming terrible 
fate of the Temple and city lying outspread be- 
fore him, would have engrossed every thought. 
He was in the afternoon, even twilight, of his 
ministry, and the shadow of the cross was fall- 
ing upon him, and yet here he sat absorbed in 
the contemplation of the i)eople as they gave 
to God. 

The fact of divine attention to the gifts of 
men is the thought presented by this scene. 
This attention is seen all through the Bible. 
Whenever individual or nation gave to God, 
the notice of heaven was instantly secured. 
I^OY did it end with a mere contemplation of 
the act, but the divine favor and blessing was 
poured out in such a remarkable manner that 
the people rejoiced. This attention is still 
kept up. No one ever gave freely and largely 
of his means, and according to his means, but 
felt at once the loving, approving smile of God 
upon the soul. Evidently much is bound up 
in the act of giving. 

God regards it as so essential that a law con- 
cerning it was passed upon the children of Is- 
rael, or more truly was continued from the 
time of Abraham, for the tithe law existed in 



CHURCH ENTERTAINMENTS. 



liis day and was observed by him. Let us all 
remember that the covenant with Abraham has 
never been repealed. Moreover it is well to 
bear in mind, that the tithe law that existed 
with the patriarchs and afterwards in the Mo- 
saic dispensation might certainly be tKonght 
worthy of observance in our day. 

If God ever manifested indignation, it was 
when he declared to his chosen people that 
they had robbed him in tithes and oflferiDgs ; 
and his approbation was as distinctly marked, 
when in David's time the people offered to him 
with a glad and willing heart ; while the word 
spoken to Cornelius by an angel was that his 
alms had gone as a memorial before God. Not 
only was the amount, but the manner and 
place of giving is carefully laid down in the 
Old Testament, while Paul in the New, under 
the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, appoints the 
first day of the week, but leaps from the tithe 
law to the nobler, freer, higher law expressed 
in the words, "Let every man lay by him a& 
God hath prospered him." 

Everything proclaims the divine interest in 
the matter of giving. It is felt both by God 
and man to be declarative of the inner or state 



TWEISTTY OBJECTIOXS. 



life. We love to give to those we love. Xo 
exhortation is needed to make a devoted parent 
give to the child, or the affectionate husband 
to the wife. One of the plainest marks and in- 
dications of the presence of love is the desire 
to give. This is true between man and man, 
and man and woman, and man and God. 

You cannot prevent these expressions of 
love : they are felt to be a relief to the love- 
burdened heart : we are bound to give. God 
is love, and he is giving all the time. Who 
-can count his mercies and blessings I When 
we love, giving will follow ; and the more we 
l)ecome like God, the more will we love to give 
and the more will we give. One can readily 
xinderstand why Christ lingered that morning, 
watching the people as they cast their gifts in- 
to the Treasury. 

God's interest in giving is seen also in the 
fact of its formative influence. There is noth- 
ing that affects the character more remarkably 
than the giving or withholding from God of 
our substance. The ministry and others who 
liave been called to deal with people in the 
church and religious life will readily agree with 
me here. 



6 CHURCH ENTERTAIISTMEj^TS. 

Now lately, in lien of direct personal giving 
to God, there has crept into practice what is 
called the Chnrch Entertainment method. In 
some places it is altogether relied npon in ob- 
taining funds for the support and extension of 
Christ's kingdom ; in others it is used to sup- 
plement the gifts of the congregation. Now, 
as giving is so intimately connected with the 
spiritual life; as it is both declarative and 
formative of the religious character; as God 
has ever commanded, expected and had it ob- 
served ; and as the church entertainment plan 
is becoming in many places a substitute for the 
direct personal method of giving to God ; and 
inasmuch as this method takes at the same 
time most remarkable liberties with our houses 
of worship — it becomes us to examine it pray- 
erfully and faithfully. We should study it in 
every possible light; mark its nature, spirit^ 
work and tendency ; observe its effect on piety, 
finance and the congregation, as well as the 
world — and so come to a just and true conclu- 
sion. 

I have made this study of the church enter- 
tainment for years, and do most unhesitatingly 
give it as my opinion, and that of countless 



TWEJS^TY OBJECTIONS. 



thousands in the land, that it is a great evil ; 
that, whether taken in its milder or graver 
forms, it always remains wrong in principle, 
spirit and practice, and as such cannot enjoy 
the divine smile and blessing, and furthermore 
never will. 

I recognize several distinct classes of people 
engaged in the church entertainment. One is 
composed of really excellent Christians — peo- 
ple who want to do something for Christ, and 
know not how or where else to devote their 
time and energies. Ignorant of the evil con- 
nected with and growing out of this ecclesias- 
tical mistake, and failing to receive pulpit in- 
structions in regard to the matter, they give 
their sympathy, labor and presence to a cus- 
tom which otherwise they would not. 

A second class is composed of thoughtless 
people who plunge into anything and almost 
everything without a single inquiry. It is a 
small matter to them whether they attend a 
monkey-show or a revival meeting. These per- 
sons are well known in every community and 
every church. 

A third class is made up of worldly members 
of the church. They joined without experi- 



8 CHURCH EJN^TERTAIlSrMElS^TS. 

encing any change of heart and have brought 
into the midst of God's people and altars the 
tastes, appetites, opinions and spirit of the 
world. They have given up attendance upon 
places plainly forbidden by the Word of God 
and the rules of the church, and they are too 
conscientious to perjure themselves and bring 
reproach on the cause of Christ by a violation 
of vows assumed solemnly and voluntarily ; but 
they are in heart unrenewed and in mind un- 
convinced, and hence think of and lean towards 
Egypt, in the midst of Israel. This being the 
case, they take most kindly and naturally to 
the church entertainment which, remarkable to 
say, offers them in modified form almost every 
phase and feature of worldliness which they 
have renounced. This class take enthusiastic- 
ally to the entertainment, not so much that 
through it they can raise funds for the church, 
but because they enjoy it. It is a gratification 
to certain carnal and worldly instincts of the 
heart. Of course this class will never see the 
objectionableness to church suppers, fairs, fes- 
tivals, bazaars, grab-bags, fish-ponds, gambling, 
pink teas, tableaux, theatrical representations, 
sleight-of-hand performances, and countless 



TWEKTY OBJECTIONS. 9 

other worldly things done to-day in the church 
of God. All argument, illustration and Script- 
ure will fail with them until converted. The 
other two classes can be more easily persuaded. 
Would, however, that all could see the evils 
bound up in and that are bound to flow from 
the Church Entertainment. 

To-day I desire to present to you a list of ob- 
jections to church entertainments which I be- 
lieve will be recognized and appreciated by 
every reflective and spiritual mind. 



My first objection is that the Church Enter- 
tainment precipitates into the church the most 
agitating and disturbing of all things — money- 
making. 

God has asked the church to do a great many 
things for him, but here is one I am devoutful- 
ly thankful he has never required of her as an 
institution. He has commanded us to visit the 
sick, relieve the poor, remember the stranger, 
go to the prisoner, clothe the naked, preach 
the gospel — but never has he imposed upon us 
the duty of making money for him. The brief- 
est thought upon this point would convince us 



10 CHURCH EJSTTEKTAIJSTMENTS. 

of the utter unlikeliliood of such a command 
or requisition. There is nothing more agitat- 
ing than money-making. The rush, the con- 
fusion and bickering that we see on our streets, 
in our stores and market-places, is the result 
of the struggle after money. The cause of al- 
most all the litigation in the courts is found to 
proceed from this disturbing fact of money- 
making or money-losing. Does any one in his 
senses believe that God in full recognition of 
this fact would project into his church the 
same prolific cause of disturbance and distrac- 
tion ? Would he permit, much less authorize, 
proceedings in his house that would divert the 
mind and the gaze of the people from his Son, 
and engage them in business-like proceedings^ 
that absorb attention, consume energy and 
time, to the forgetfulness of the one great 
work that the church is called to do ! Does 
God want the clamor, confusion, excitement 
and pandemonium in his house that we have 
beheld in the stock exchanges in our cities ! 

Who has not beheld transactions in the 
church that have approximated these scenes 
of commercial excitement ? 

Let any one look at the commotion, watcL 



TWENTY OBJECTIOJSrS. 11 

the bartering, mark the business driving — and 
then ask his soul if he believes that God would 
be the author of such proceedings. 

Again, I discover in the Scriptures constant 
warnings against the love of money. It is the 
root, God says, of all evil. Can I believe that 
he, with the knowledge of its subtile and pow- 
erful influence upon the heart — that he would 
project into his church a method calculated to 
excite the very evil and awaken the very pas- 
sion he would destroy ! One of the great ef- 
forts of the Holy Spirit is to wrest men from 
their business life and undertakings, to entice 
their thoughts from trade and traffic while 
they sit in the temples of worship all over the 
land. Will he contradict himself here? Is 
God inconsistent ? Certainly he would be if he 
placed before me in the church practices and 
methods that brought me back by association 
at once into the whirl and rush of the money- 
making life that I thought I had left in the 
world outside, and that could not follow me 
across the threshold of the church door. 

Certainly there is no greater delusion on the 
part of the church to-day than this idea that 
God expects it to make money for him. God: 



12 CHURCH EIS^TERTAIISTMET^TS. 

would not thus defeat his own plan and bring 
to naught the one Avork of Zion. Individual 
members of the church are expected to make 
money in their secular callings and pursuits ; 
but the congregation as a church — never. The 
whole teaching of the Scriptures, and the teach- 
ing of history as well, prove that if the church 
will see to the salvation of souls, all the money 
it needs will be forthcoming. I have never 
heard of nor read of an exception to this rule. 
It is a rule, and a divine one at that. Church 
pride will bring us into debt, but a congrega- 
tion that will devote their whole energy to sav- 
ing souls will not lack any good thing. Men 
will bring their money as of yore and lay it 
down at the apostles' feet. All that God asks 
of us is to bring souls to him — and he will see 
to the money. The Bible teaches that no man 
goes to war at his own expense. God sees to 
the expenses if we are really in the war. He 
does not furnish money for spiritual picnicking 
and dress- parades — but for real gospel warfare 
with the world and the devil. Let the church 
•see to the salvation of the people — and God 
will see to the money. 

We have confirmation of this fact in Individ- 



TWEISTTY OBJECTIONS. 13 

Tials and churches. Here we have to-day trav- 
eling all over the country a i)rominent preacher 
lecturing in behalf of his church. He is fairly 
wearing himself out, and yet in spite of it all 
he doesn't seem able to raise funds sufficient to 
meet his contract obligations. The papers 
spoke the other day of some litigation in regard 
to the unfinished building. If, instead of fly- 
ing over the country, this ministerial lecturer 
would remain with the flock over which God 
has made him overseer, comforting, visiting, 
praying with, and leading souls to Christ, God 
would touch the heart of some millionaire and 
give him all the money he wants. But no ; he 
thinks God expects the church and preacher to 
make money, and away he goes on his eccentric 
course. 

Across the water we have a marvelous con- 
trast. A man that stays by his work, and calls 
on God for help — and the help comes, and has 
come, and will continue to come. He is work- 
ing to save, and God has sent him money 
enough to build twelve asylums and feed thou- 
sands of children. The same fact is repeated 
in the case of General Booth ; he is saving — 
and God is sending him the money. 



14 CHURCH ENTERTAHSTMENTS. 

I have seen the same fact illustrated in 
churches. I recall a congregation that is for- 
ever giving church entertainments, and it i^. 
never out of debt. I recall another religious 
gathering, where the one purpose, desire and 
labor is to save souls, and where one day there 
was a quiet call on the people for a considera- 
ble amount of money. The scene that followed 
beggars description. The people arose and 
came down like a tide to the table where thev 
were requested to place their offerings. With 
songs and shouts and shining faces they poured 
forward and gave until the table was piled up 
with money, and it began to roll off on the 
floor. The amount called for was raised — and 
there was left over a thousand dollars, which 
was given to the cause of Foreign Missions. 

II. 

My second objection is that the Church En- 
tertainment is a perversion and desecration of 
the House of God. 

That God is jealous about his house is evi- 
denced by the commands in regard to its sacred 
keeping, the complaints in regard to certain 
conduct near its door, the swift punishment 



TWENTY OBJECTIONS. 15 

and death that overtook those profaning it at 
different times, and by the holy indignation 
manifested by the Savior at the condition in 
which he found it on two different occasions. 

The reasons for keeping the house of God 
lioly will readily occur. As God is holy, his 
liouse should be holy. Then its purpose is 
purely a spiritual one, and this fact alone 
should preserve it from anything of a secular 
and irreligious nature. That this is contem- 
plated by the church can be seen in the Ritual 
of our Discipline, where in the form of church 
dedication we find these words: ''We present 
to you this house to be set apart from all un- 
hallowed or common uses for the worship of 
Almighty God." An additional reason is 
found in the effect on ourselves of desecrating 
a holy place. God can stand it — he is not hurt 
or made less holy by what we do to his earthly 
temples ; but we are hurt. I am no Romanist 
in feeling and lay no improper emphasis and 
value on wood and stone ; but I observe that 
such is the constitution of our moral nature, 
that we cannot act in an imseemly and unbefit- 
ting way in the house of God without receiving 
spiritual damage. 



16 CHURCH E]N^TERTAINMENTS. 

The Church Entertainment fairly floods the 
sacred building with every conceivable kind of 
proceedings. We have eating and drinking, 
laughing and chatting, clapping of hands and 
stamping of feet; the house is often made a 
playground of, and the altar rail is as familiar- 
ly handled as a gymnastic pole. Then what 
shall we say of the theaters, concerts, exhibi- 
tions, broom-drills and other performances fol- 
lowing each other. in quick succession! The 
reverence we seek to inspire on Sunday is. 
wiped out on Monday. Suppose a heathen 
man should look in through our church win- 
dows upon one of our church entertainments 
when it was in full blast. There before him 
are crowds of people with plates and saucers in 
their hands, all eating for dear life ; here and 
there are groups of people sending forth peals 
of laughter ; young people romping and chas- 
ing each other about; confusion, rattle of 
plates, clinking of glasses and spoons, and loud- 
voiced merriment everywhere. What would 
be the thoughts of the man as he pondered the 
scene ? Would he not be amazed if told that 
this was a church ? Then would he ask, Is this 
your worship — is your God a Kitchen God— 



TWENTY OBJECTIOlsrS. 17 



does this kind of Avorship please him ( Is gour- 
mandizing a part of your service ? 

I am well acquainted with the arguments 
used and defense made for this improper use 
of the house of God. 

One thing said is, that certain rooms have 
been built to the church for these entertain- 
ment transactions, and that the part devoted 
to religious worship is not encroached upon. 
This very thing shows certain conscientious 
scruples, and it is besides a concession to the 
demands of the spiritual part of the church 
membership. And it is done also because there 
is lodged in the corner-stone of the church a 
certain document which reads that '* no church 
fair or festival shall ever be allowed in this 
building." Such a document rests in the cor- 
ner-stone of First Church in St. Louis ; would 
that all the other churches had a like paper ! 
This building of a few rooms under the eaves 
of the church is not only a compromise with 
conscience — but when examined thoroughly is 
not even sincere. It cannot stand the light of 
the truth. I press this thought upon you this 
morning that, if Centenary Church was to burn 
up to-morrow, you would proceed at once to 



18 CHTTKOTT ENTERTAHS^METiTTS. 



collect the amount of insurance, making no dif- 
ference in your minds between church building 
property and adjoining rooms. Furthermore, 
you have already in the insurance policy called 
the whole combined structure Centenary 
Church— it exists as such in your thoughts, 
and you would collect for it as one building 
without once separating or dividing it in your 
minds. 

I would furthermore add that the desecration 
of the Temple in Christ's time took place in the 
court of the Gentiles ; not in or by the Temple 
proper, not even in the court of the priests, or 
the court of the men, or the farther-off court of 
the women ; but in the distant enclosure re- 
served for the Gentiles. And yet, mark the 
Savior's indignation. Putting a wrong thing 
off to some distance, more or less, does not 
change its nature. If a thing is not right I 
neither want it in my parlor, dining-room nor 
kitchen. I don't want it in my house, or un- 
der the eaves of my house, or in a room built 
to and opening into my house. 

Another defense made is, that what is done 
and made at the entertainment is in the inter- 
ests of the church. It is all to help the good 



TWENTY OBJECTIONS. 19 

cause along. Verily, that is like putting a suit 
of clothes on a man while you stab him to the 
heart with a dagger. What is the financial 
gain as compared with the spiritual loss of the 
church ! Moreover, I press this thought, that 
this very excuse was made by the desecrators 
of the Temple. They said, it is true that we 
have brought considerable confusion into the 
Temple by the introduction of these animals 
and money tables ; but is not all for the good 
of the Temple? People must have lambs and 
doves to offer for worship ; visitors from differ- 
ent countries are here with all kinds of money 
which has to be changed into the shekel of the 
sanctuary. By having these things on hand 
we assist the stranger, accommodate everybody 
and actually help on the worship of the house 
of God. How plausible it all sounded ! How 
fertile human nature is in coating and covering 
up its misdeeds! How we give the name of 
virtues to our vices and go on self-deceived. 

It all sounded very well ; but mark you what 
Christ said and did for all that. He platted a 
scourge, and with rebuking eye and irresistible 
majesty of presence, drove out tradesmen, 
herds and flocks, overturned the tables of the 



20 CHURCH ENTERTAIN^MET^TS. 

money-changers — cleansed, in a word, the Tem- 
pie — saying in tones of mingled sorrow and in- 
dignation: ''It is written, my house shall be 
called the house of prayer, but ye have made 
it a den of thieves." 

Still another plea put in by a minister to me 
one day is, that if a few of God's children come 
together in the church and sell in a quiet way 
various articles they have prepared or manu- 
factured, then he could not see any harm in the 
transaction. My instant reply to him was, 
that one single word and sentence falling from 
the lips of Christ condemned the whole thing 
and left him no ground to stand upon. That 
word is ''merchandise," and the sentence is, 
^Hliou shalt not make my Father'' s Tiouse a 
place of merchandised A place of merchan- 
dise is a place of buying and selling. It shall 
not be done, Christ says, in My Father's House. 

But, said another minister to me, I fail to see 
and believe that the Tabernacle or Temple is a 
standard or any way representative of the 
Christian church. 

My reply to that is. Has God had two 
churches? Has there not been but one all 
alon^? Is God careful about the church in one 



TWENTY OBJECTIONS. 21 



age, and careless about it in another ! Did not 
Christ, in the cleansing of the Temple at the 
very close of his ministry, and at the fulfillment 
of all types and symbols, did he not thereby 
powerfully declare his mind and desire in re- 
gard to the treatment and sacred use of his 
church in the future ? 

If Christ is jealous about his house at one 
time, and indifferent at another period, then he 
is contradictory. He bewilders me, and 1 know 
not how to understand him. Instead of this, 
he changes not — his own Word saying, "He is 
the same yesterday, to-day and forever." 
That which grieved him two hundred years 
ago, would grieve him again if repeated in our 
time and in his church. 

An additional plea was made by still another 
minister in my hearing. He said that he re- 
garded the stomach as a religious organ, and 
failed to see where any harm was done in a lit- 
tle friendly, sociable supper at the church. 
How men use the word "little" when involved 
in moral uncertainties! Lot said to the Lord, 
Cannot I stop in Zoar? It is true that it is one 
of the Cities of the Plain that has come under 
your displeasure, but "it is a little one, oh let 



22 CHURCH EIN-TERTAIISTMET^TS. 



me escape thither (is it not a little one ?) ; and 
my soul shall live." 

As for ' ' the stomach being a religious organ, ' ^ 
I had not and have not so found it. My relig- 
ious organs are higher up. In fact, I discover 
that it is one of the members that needs to 
be mortified and crucified, rather than pam- 
pered. It is a part of the body that I am told 
to keep under; and, remarkable to say, the 
greater religious blessing I receive, the weaker 
becomes the dominion of the appetites. There 
have been moments in my life when I was so 
blessed in God's love that the thought of food 
revolted me. 

I recall the fact that, when Christ undertook 
the redemption of the world and entered^ upon 
the great battle in the wilderness, when he 
needed every religious organ — that, instead of 
eating, he fasted forty days and nights. I also 
recall his statements that there were some sins 
that would not come out except by fasting and 
prayer. This was a remarkable statement if 
the stomach is a religious organ ! Besides this, 
his striking representation of a world that had 
forgotten God before the Flood and forgets him 



TWEISTTY OBJECTIOlSrS. 23 



again before the Judgment Day is seen in the 
words, ''they were eating and drinking." 

I am glad that the Bible says that the King- 
dom of God is not meat nor drinks but right- 
eousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost. 

As for having suppers in the house of the 
Lord, I quote but two passages of Scripture in 
condemnation of the practice. One is in Luke 
11 . 16 : ' ' And he would not suffer that any man 
should carry any vessel through the Temple." 
In some of our churches we have to-day hun- 
dreds of vessels. 

The other passage is in 1 Cor. 11. 22 : * ' What ! 
have ye not houses to eat and drink in ? or de- 
spise ye the church of God, and shame them 
that have not ? What shall I say to you ? shall 
I praise you in this ? I praise you not." 

III. 

My third objection to the Church Entertain- 
ment is, that it is a misconception of the mis- 
sion of the church. 

The church was never sent to entertain men. 
Certainly of all labors this would be the most 
difficult as well as the most thankless of under- 
takings. Ten thousand thousand theaters, lee- 



24 CITURCTI ElSrTERTATlS'MElvrTS. 

ture and concert halls, and other places of 
amusement are attempting this giga'ntic task. 
Actors, lecturers, readers, clowns, buffoons, 
humorists and mountebanks of every descrip- 
tion are daily and hourly grappling with the 
work in profound uncertainty, each time, 
whether there will be success or failure, wheth- 
er they will be greeted with clapping of hands 
or groans and hisses. 

O how glad I am that this impossible, undig- 
nified and unprofitable toil is not laid on the 
Church of Christ ! I look in vain all through 
the Scripture for the slightest authority or com- 
mand in any direction. It is not there. Read 
Paul's direction to Timothy. Is the entertain- 
ing idea in those solemn, tearful injunctions? 
Read Christ's last charge to Peter about his 
sheep and lambs. Is there anything here about 
entertaining them or amusing them? Sheep 
and lambs don't need to be amused. Shep- 
herds do not waste time in such a senseless 
proceeding. Turn to Christ's commission to 
the disciples and the church after them. Is it 
^'Go ye out into all the world and entertain 
them" ? Nothing of the kind. Each evangel- 



TWKXTY OBJECTIOj^S. 25 



ist tells Y>^liat is said, and they all agree that 
the one word was to preach the gospel. 

Some would make the word "teach" a war- 
rant for believing in many unevangelistic do- 
ings. But fortunately the word teach is fol- 
lowed by a restrictive clause. , Teach what? 
Not philosophy, nor poetry, nor the drama, 
nor historic personages, or, lower still, the art 
of cooking. What, then? Here it is — "the 
things which I have spoken unto you. ' ' Where 
did Christ mention philosophy or philosopher, 
poetry or poet, drama or actor? Whatman 
did he ever mention but men of God — men who 
stood closely related to God and his Provi- 
dence? And even then it was but a passing 
notice or word. 

The church has become absolutely insane on 
the subject of entertaining men. Preachers 
iire sought after who can amuse the people. 
Meetings of all kinds are devised to please and 
keep the congregation during the week, while 
the preacher, with anecdote, sparkling wit and 
broad jest, must do the rest of the work on 
Sunday. Whatever happens, the people must 
be entertained. The idea being that, if not 
•ximused, they will all drift away and be lost. 



26 CHURCH ENTERTAIJSrMEiS^TS. 

This whole idea of entertaining the people at 
God's house conies from Satan, and is one of 
the most subtle and dangerous of all his move- 
ments upon and against Christianity. He 
knows that if Christ is held up before the peo- 
ple, and men look steadily at him, they will 
be saved. Hence, his idea is to divert the 
church from doing this wise and heavenly, and 
powerful and saving thing. He whisi)ers that 
Christ alone is not enough to draw souls : that 
it takes Christ and jokes, Christ and lectures, 
Christ and entertainments. As he discovers 
his success in blinding the church, he becomes 
more aggressive, and whispers again that, if 
the naked cross be held up — the simple, strict, 
holy life of Jesus be insisted on — then all the 
young people will be driven away. That young 
people are young people, and must be amused ^ 
and old people have to be entertained, and en- 
tertainment must be provided. So he tempts, 
and so he has succeeded in thousands of in- 
stances, in side-tracking the church. He has 
switched her off from the one blessed heavenly 
employment of crying, "Behold the Lamb," 
and she is now part lyceum, part theater and 
part kitchen. As you pass her doors to-day 



TWENTY OBJECTIOIS^S. 27 

yon will hear the name of Socrates, Plato, Ar- 
istotle, Emerson, Tyndall, Darwin and others 
far more frequently than the name of Christ ; 
while, instead of sobs and cries of "What 
must I do to be saved?" you will be greeted 
with clapping of hands, rattle of plates and 
bursts of uproarious applause. 

A side-tracked church ! 

The church engaged in the noble, exalted, 
heavenly, sj)iritual and soul-saving employ- 
ment of amusing the crowd ! 

Think of the Church of Christ posing as an 
entertainer before the public ! 

To-day the country is filled with her chil- 
dren engaged in this work. Her ministers are 
flying about in every direction in this earth- 
demanded, but not heaven-appointed work. 
One recently visited our city lecturing on an 
old-time philosopher. Another, the same 
week, came with a lecture on a politician of 
the present day. Who were these, this phi- 
losopher and the politician, but sinners ? They 
were men, and sinners at that. And yet, two 
men, anointed of God to give their entire time 
to preaching Jesus Christ, cross the breadth of 
a large nation to speak for two hours to large 



38 CHURCH EIS^TERTAITTMEIN^TS. 

assemblies about men like ourselves. Did the 
Holy Ghost separate them for such a work as 
this? In the solemn, awful, holy call to the 
ministry is not the soul conscious that a single 
message to the world is delivered to it : a single 
person to be held up before dying man — and 
that person the man "Christ Jesus? 

Recently the city of St. Louis was regaled 
with the sight of a certain professor, who ap- 
peared in our midst ready to entertain the pub- 
lic with a series of spectacular exhibitions. He 
proposed to do it for the church, in the church 
and by the help of the church. Different from 
most stage managers, he finds his troupe at 
each church. He lays his hand upon the young 
people of the church and used God's children 
and property for a world's entertainment. As 
the church in each place he visits furnishes the 
troupe, he is saved much expense in keeping 
up a regular traveling company of actors. 

The spectacle was a sad one. While there 
was nothing criminal or outrageous in the ex- 
hibition, yet the mission of the church was 
again forgotten and made to sink down to the 
level occupied by the amusement halls and mi- 
nor grade theaters of the world. 



TWEKTY OBJECTIONS. 29 

The churcli is, I repeat, insane on the sub- 
ject of entertaining the public. The land is 
traversed with preachers from great distances, 
lecturing upon everything and everybody but 
Christ. If he, the Holy One, appears at all, 
he is thrust in a corner ; or brought out for a 
moment, as I have seen a child presented for a 
short while to the guests and then banished to 
a back room or kitchen. 

I have sinned in this regard myself in the 
years that are gone. But God opened my eyes 
to my mistake, and I have done with the 
wretched half-way business forever. Don't 
think I do not get invitations to lecture still. 
They come constantly — three only this week. 
One was to go to Chicago. My invariable re- 
ply is, that I cannot come. I am too busy ; I 
have a better work. I prefer to hold up an 
undivided Christ. I feel that a preacher's lips 
are consecrated, and as such, belong peculiarly 
to Christ. 

Let lawyers, professors, men of science and 
unprofessional citizens go around lecturing on 
branches of science, historic characters, etc. — 
it is all right for them, and they will do good 
for Christ in these fields — but let the preacher 



30 CHURCH E]^TERTAI]N"ME]SrTS. 

Stand by the one work given liim by the Holy 
Ghost — and that work to cry, '^Behold the 
Lamb !" 

Some one has charged me with doing wrong 
in writing a book of travels to Palestine. That 
I should not have lost the time in doing this. 
But my reply is, that I wrote almost the entire 
volume while journeying through foreign coun- 
tries, and that the ti:ne spent thus in writing 
and traveling was a four months' leave of ab- 
sence, granted me by my church in New Or- 
leans, to rest and recuperate after three years' 
of heavy pastoral and pulpit work. 

I cannot believe that the church is under ob- 
ligations to furnish lecturers to the w^orld. 
Let me impress you how it would appear in 
gospel times. I arrive in Ephesus late in the 
afternoon, and inquire my way to the church 
where Apollos preaches with real spiritual 
power. But I am told he is not in the city. 
Why, is not this Wednesday one of his regular 
services? ''Oh, yes; but he has gone up to 
Smyrna to lecture on the character of Plato." 

''But I thought he was a man of soul-burn- 
ing piety, and brought so many souls to Christ, 



TWENTY OBJECTIOIS^S. 31 

that he would not be diverted from such a 
work." 

''True; but he says Plato was a man of ad- 
mirable character and that it will do the young 
men good to hear of him." 

And so I go to Jerusalem and inquire after 
Peter. The answer is that he is not in the city ; 
he is absent in Antioch lecturing to the people 
on the Life, Sayings and Character of Socrates ! 

How would all this appear to you ? If the 
thought shocks you in regard to those Script- 
ural characters, why should it not shock jon 
that men equally called of God to the work of 
the ministry should devote their precious lim- 
ited time and strength to lecturing about old- 
time philosophers and present-day politicians ? 

The fact that the newspapers say the lecture 
w^as excellent does not make it right. The fact 
that some of them have certificates from nota- 
ble men and scientific circles does not make the 
proceeding right. Let us look at one : 

This is to certify that I, Pontius Pilate, heard 
Simon Peter lecture on the "Life, Sayings and 
Character of Socrates." The lecture was re- 
plete with learning, telling hits and fine points. 
The lecturer handled his subject well. He 



33 CHURCH EJSTTERTAIJSrMENTS. 

showed intimate acquaintance with the cus- 
toms and laws of ancient Greece, while his por- 
trayal of the men of that early day was most 
graphic and impressive. We joredict for Dr. 
Simon Peter a great future in the lecture field, 
and our academies of learning may congratu- 
late themselves on such an accession into their 
midst. PoisTTius Pilate, 

Governor of Judea. 

Jerusalem^ Month of Abib. 

How would such a document look and sound 
in apostolic times ? If wrong then, Avhy not 
wrong now ? 

I repeat for the third time that the church is 
insane on the subject of entertaining the peo- 
ple. The congregations don't need to be 
amused or diverted in any way. They need 
Christ in his constant presence and fullness. It 
is not entertainment nor recreation that the 
people want, but a full, joyous and blessed sal- 
vation. It is not such a supper as human be- 
ings can prepare that can supply the wants and 
satisfy the longings of the church, but such a 
supper as Christ prepares in the heart, and 
where he feasts wdth us. Give the people the 
living bread in the heart and the constant gush- 



TWEJSTTY OBJECTIONS. 33 

ing of the water of life in the soul, and they 
will ask for nothing else, they will be satisfied. 

IV. 

My fourth objection is, that there is no war- 
rant or example for it in Scripture. You may 
be sure that so important a duty as giving, or 
Christian liberality, will be mentioned. And 
when we remember that the church, in all of 
its manifold interests, is to be supported and 
advanced by these gifts, we may expect a very 
clear and unmistakable mention as to spirit and 
method. Other duties less important are en- 
joined and manner of performance described. 
Shall not the mode of giving acceptably to God 
be laid down ? It is laid down, clearly defined, 
and illustrated again and again by human ex- 
ample. But let me say, that you will look in 
vain from the beginning to the end of the Bi- 
ble for even so much as a hint of the church 
entertainment. 

Before you commit me to a religious practice, 
you must show me a ''thus saith the Lord." 
But who can lay his hands on any passage that 
can be construed into authority for the creation, 
or justification for the existence of, this eccle- 



34 CHUECH EISTTERTAINMENTS. 

siastical financial dodge, called the '^clinrcb 
entertainment" ? 

There have been occasions in the early his- 
tory of the church when, according to the ideas 
of many Christians to-day, the people of God 
would have been perfectly justified in institut- 
ing such proceedings. For instance, when the 
Israelites, impoverished after a long captivity, 
were called on to build the Tabernacle, and af- 
terward the Temple. And, again, when the 
Philippian Church, composed mainly of poor 
people, was called on to bear some heavy ex- 
penses connected with the gospel. Now was 
the time for fairs, suppers, and other clever and 
respectable avoidances of duty. But I am 
happy to tell you, that in these instances and 
others mentioned in the Word, that God's peo- 
ple refused to dodge the issue, but met their 
duty fairly and squarely, and, poor as they 
were, gave and continued to give, until Moses 
in the first instance gave the signal to stop, and 
Paul in the other told the Philippians that in 
their poverty they had abounded in their lib- 
erality. Look, my brethren, when and where 
you will in this Book, and as long as you will, 
but you will never find a word falling from the 



TWENTY OBJECTIOlSrS. 35 

lips of Grod the Father, God the Son, or God 
the Holy Ghost, or from prophet or priest, or 
apostle or disciple, that ordered or justified the 
institution of the chnrch entertainment as the 
method, or a method, of raising funds for the 
support on earth of the cause of God. 

Y. 

My fifth objection is, that it neutralizes and 
defeats God' s plans and labors in behalf of the 
spiritual life of his people. Life is an enigma 
to me if you eliminate God actively at work 
with your souls, preparing them for another 
and better life. By his calls and movements 
he is awaking and developing graces, gifts and 
powers within you that are to bless you here 
and glorify you hereafter. Upon no power 
does he more frequently call, than the benevo- 
lent faculty. He is trying to establish the love 
principle, and secure a generous, liberal move- 
ment to your nature. Study men when and 
where you will, and you will discover that 
those individuals who have most endeared 
themselves to men, lingered longest in grateful 
esteem and memory, those who most nearly ap- 
proximated the divine image, and were felt to be 



36 CHURCH EIN'TERTAIISTMEIS^TS. 

Christ-like, were those who abounded most in 
this spirit and life of love and liberality. All 
men have not the same means to be generous. 
But all have the same power to be liberal. It 
can come to its full perfection as much in the 
soul of the seamstress as it does in the soul of 
the millionaire ; the first through the response 
of pennies to the call of G-od ; the second by an 
answer of thousands and tens of thousands of 
dollars. Nothing will awaken and develop 
this grace, or faculty, so much as regular, per- 
sistent, systematic giving. When it hurts, so 
much the better; when your giving entails 
money sacrifices and acts of self-denial upon 
your part, this is simply blessed for your relig- 
ious character — it is life itself to that most Q-od- 
like part of your nature. You and I do not 
always see the gracious outcome to character of 
this giving, and so sometimes say, '^ Spare such 
and such a one from the financial calls of the 
church and God's providence." But Christ 
never says '' Spare." He lets a person give to 
him as long and as much as he will. He sees 
what you do not see. I notice that when this 
poor woman at the Treasury cast in her farth- 
ing he did not check her. He knew that it was 



TWEJN-TY OBJECTIOIS^S. 37 

all she had on earth, and yet he permitted her 
to cast it in the box. He saw what you had 
not thought of, that she would gain ten thou- 
sandfold more by it, in higher and better things, 
both in this world and the world to come. And 
so when she, in the exercise of those two heav- 
enly powers, faith and love, cast in her mite, 
even all she had, Christ commended her, and 
all heaven congratulated her. 

Here now is seen the curse of the church en- 
tertainment. It comes in between God and his 
work ; between the soul and its proper exercise 
and development. It defeats God's gracious 
design, and neutralizes a work connected with 
the soul's blessedness and glory. And this it 
does while it creates the delusion in the soul 
that it is responding to divine call and duty 
when there is not a single movement of the na- 
ture God is endeavoring to awaken. The idea 
conveyed to the man is, that because his feet 
and hands are busy, and body flying around, 
that therefore the principle God is seeking to 
arouse has been called into action, when really 
nothing of the kind has been done ; and so far 
as the benevolent, liberal nature is concerned, 
it is profoundly motionless and dead ; for there 



38 CHURCH ENTERTAII^MEIS^TS. 

is nothing in the church fair, or show, to call 
it forth. I have seen a mother disciplining her 
child in love, wisdom and firmness, and sud- 
denly the father, without knowledge of the 
case, without stopping to inquire, would inter- 
fere, come between and bear oflf the child ; and 
I have seen a look of mortal anguish in the 
eyes of the mother. I could well understand 
the look. So in like manner, the church enter- 
tainment throws itself between God and the 
spirit he is trying to educate for eternity ; pre- 
venting an exercise and development of powers 
that would bring more pure joy, and true light 
and life to the soul, than almost any other vir- 
tue in the spiritual life. I charge the church 
entertainment with laying its hands upon God's 
hand, and arresting his work. 

Now bear in mind that it is not money as 
money that God desires. He is not poverty- 
stricken ; he has inlaid the floor of the sea with 
pearls, his mountains are full of gold and sil- 
ver. He could send an earthquake, some 
mighty dynamic force that would burst open 
some treasure-house in the bosom of the earth 
and scatter diamonds, as thick and bright and 
sparkling as raindrops, all over this floor. But 



TWENTY OBJECTIONS. 39 

it is not money as money that Grod wants. He 
paid no attention to the value of the gifts the 
rich men threw into the Treasury — not money 
God is after, but the cultivation of the giving 
principle ; and this the church entertainment 
defeats. 

It does even more. We are taught in the 
Bible that giving is an act of worship. It is 
frequently classed and associated with prayer. 
What said the angel to the upright Roman, 
Cornelius ? ' ' Thy prayers and alms have come 
up as a memorial before God." They went up 
together, prevailed together, were accepted to- 
gether. Now, then, if giving be so regarded 
in Scripture as an act of worship, then it is just 
as proper and advisable to treat people to ber- 
ries and cream and charades, in order to get 
them to pray, as to do these things to get them 
to give. The additional feature of evil in the 
^church entertainment is seen in that it lays a 
ruthless hand upon a beautiful religious act, 
and transforms it into a common commercial 
transaction. 

yi. 

My sixth objection is, that it creates the im- 



40 CHURCH EXTERTAIKMENTS. 

pression on the world that the great aim and 
struggle of the church is for money. There is 
no question in my mind, but that if some 
churches showed as much activity and unan- 
imity in the work of saving souls, as they da 
in selling oysters, more people would join our 
congregations, and there would be no lack of 
money. I grieve to say that the church has a 
financial look in its eye, a kind of mental sum- 
ming up of an individual's financial worth, as 
though men were precious according to the 
amount of money they were willing to contrib- 
ute. Nothing is more calculated to disgust 
men than this. Let a man feel that the churck 
yearns over him in love, for his immortal spirit, 
and you bend him as the winds do a weeping- 
willow. But when the church swoops and 
moves down upon the masses with the smell of 
the kitchen upon it, and with the invitation 
not to come to church, but to come and stuff at 
so much a saucer, then the world is nauseat- 
ed and says of the church, as a certain promi- 
nent gentleman said recently of Kirmess: '^If 
that be the spirit and fruit of Christianity, 
then God save me from Christianity!" I re- 
member an exhortation given once by a bishop 



TWEISTTY OBJECTIONS. 41 

to a class of young preachers : ' ' Let me beseech 
you," he said, ''not to labor for the fleece of 
the sheep, but for the sheep themselves!" It 
would be well for every church to take it as a 
motto. I knew a church once where, when- 
ever the pastor took in a new member, some of 
the members and officials would ask what he 
was worth. It was not enough that there was 
a soul for which Christ died. They were think- 
ing of something else altogether ; so that the 
child or poor person joining never elicited the 
least interest. Do you wonder that people 
were slow to unite with such a congregation ? 
do you wonder that Grod literally dried it up 
as an organization by removing his presence 
and blessing ? Oh, brethren, great is the change 
that has come over the church ! there was a 
time when it stood and wept, saying: "How 
often I would have gathered you as a hen doth. 
gather her brood under her wing !" But now 
it seeks to gather sinners for a different reason, 
and with a different spirit. It is not souls she 
wants so much as dollars. It is not to get men 
to write their names in the Book of Life, but 
to write them at the bottom of bank checks for 
twenty, fifty, and a hundred dollars. I charge 



42 CHUECH EI^TEETAIIS-MEIN'TS. 

this upon those who advocate and foster the 
church entertainment, that they are creating 
this impression. They make the world think 
that the aim and end and consuming care of 
the church is money, when it should be souls. 

VII. 

My seventh objection is, that it is an open 
humiliation of Jesus Christ, by placing his 
cause, or church, as a mendicant at the feet of 
the world. 

Whenever there is a church entertainment 
^given, it is felt by the outside world to be an 
admission upon the part of the church of its 
inability, or disinclination, to meet its obliga- 
tions. That it either cannot or will not. We 
leave the cannot feature for another point. 
We beg your attention to one of the most hu- 
miliating and mortifying facts connected with 
the cause of Christ to-day. And it is a fact 
that cannot be questioned, and is evident to 
•everybody. And that is, that the church 
is the only institution in the land that will 
not take care of itself. Its members refuse 
to meet its just debts and obligations, and fast- 
en the humiliation upon it of making it a beg- 



TWENTY OBJECTIONS. 43 

gar before the public. There is nothing else 
like it in the land. Let me ask yon a question : 
What would you think of a corporation down 
the street, say some banking institution, send- 
ing out its clerks each morning to beg of other 
similar institutions an alms, in order to meet 
its current expenses ? What would you think 
of a family that pretended to self-respect and 
respectability sending out their children each 
morning to beg of their neighbors, as an alms, 
money to be used in defraying the regular ex- 
pense of the household ? It is a lowering of 
self, a forfeiting of self-respect, a giving up of 
true manhood. Now, tell me how it appears 
to the world for the church, an institution of 
heaven, claiming divine support and presence, 
filled with people claiming to love God, and to 
have consecrated their all to him, how does it 
appear for this church, which is sent on earth 
to rebuke, teach and save the world, to be 
found stooping at the feet of that world beg- 
ging an alms ? And just as some beggars have 
certain tricks and amusing ways by which they 
get some additional pennies, so the church has 
learned some curious ways and methods of at- 
tracting a crowd, exciting a laugh, creating a 



44 CHUECH EKTERTAIIS'MEIS'TS. 

stir, and so becomes richer by a rain of pen- 
nies. How, think you, feels the Son of God in 
heaven as he witnesses these things ? What 
does he care for money, except as it represents 
so mnch devotion and sacrifice ? 

What do they think in heaven, when the 
fact is made known that the church of Christ 
has opened restaurants and places of amuse- 
ment on earth, in order to get a few dollars 
from the world that it was commissioned to re- 
prove and warn. That Christianity has got to 
such a low ebb that it has got to beg of the 
world to get along ; that it is spending muck 
of its time in snapping up the crumbs that may 
be swept from a table of abundance, and receiv- 
ing eagerly from God haters and defiers small 
silver change, taken from the vest pocket and 
tossed toward the church oftentimes indiffer- 
ently ; but often contemptuously. Oh, it is 
enough to make every child of God to bow his 
head, while his face burns with intensest shame. 

I point you to a fact you will not deny. That 
while you will beg on the street for one not re- 
lated to you by blood, and not personally dear, 
yet you would rather die than ask alms of peo- 
ple to relieve the daily wants of loved ones. 



twej^-ty objectiojn-s. 45 

You would work your fingers to the bone be- 
fore doing it. This fact itself ought to open 
your eyes to the subject we are discussing this 
morning. This public mendicancy of the 
€hurch is a virtual admission that Christ is not 
as precious to us as he should be ; that we do 
not love him as we aught. 

What if a man should make his wife and 
daughter assist him publicly in begging for 
their support by song or dance or attitude, and 
that, too, when there was no real need to jus- 
tify such a course ? And what if the church 
thrusts out its lovely daughters upon stage and 
platform, before a mixed throng, where the 
bold glance of the worldly man roves uncheck- 
ed and critically over their forms, all for a few 
pennies? And what if it is discovered that 
there is really no state of beggary in the church 
to justify such humiliation of its daughters ? 
Humiliation upon humiliation ! Let us see how 
it would appear in apostolic times. We come 
to the famous city of Ephesus. That cloak of 
Paul is sadly in need of repair or replacing ; 
or missionary money is to be raised, or a house 
of worship built. Now, then, who shall do it ? 
Of course the church at Ephesus, upon whom 



46 CHURCH ElS^TERTAIlSrMENTS. 

the Holy Ghost had fallen under the preaching 
of the apostle. Certainly they will be glad ta 
do it. Not at all ! Instead they say, let the 
world foot the bill. Let these Ephesian out- 
siders give the money, while the church fur- 
nishes the brain work, the planning, the ar- 
ranging ; in a word, the making the motions of 
giving. The church will get the credit, at 
home, abroad and in the Jerusalem Conference, 
for having raised the money ; but the church 
has a sly smile and twinkle in its eye ; it re- 
marks behind its hand, it will all come out of 
these worldly Ephesian pockets ! Oh, heaven- 
ly cunning ! Oh, celestial adroitness ! Look 
at their plan. Peter is sent down at once to the 
sea, where he throws in a line and draws out 
several fine specimens of the deep. These are 
cut, and fried, and sold at fabulous prices at 
the church supper. It was not the first time 
that Peter had got money out of a fish. Lydia 
is sent for to preside over this table ; as a sales- 
woman she knew how to drive a trade, and 
thus protect the interests of the church. 
Aquila and Priscilla are in town still making 
tents. They are requested to make one espe- 
cially for this church entertainment ; also a 



TWEIN-TY OBJECTIOIS^S. 47 

drop curtain for some stage performances to be^ 
had. In tlie tent is placed Rlioda, and the^ 
soothsaying damsel ont of whom Paul had cast 
an evil spirit. These two females are to tell 
fortunes at so much an individual; childreni 
half-price. Some one suggested sending off for 
the daughter of Herodias to pose before the- 
crowd. No sooner said than done. It is true^ 
she was getting along in years, but she was fa- 
mous, and could cut a caper or two and draw a 
crowd. At this juncture it was learned that 
Drusilla was in the city. True, she was a bad 
woman, had broken a number of God's com- 
mandments, but she had a fine figure, and could 
represent some heathen deity, or historical 
character in costume, and draw many Ephe- 
sians. So a committee was sent to wait upon 
her with this request — and she consented ta 
help the starving cause of Christ by posing be- 
fore a mixed audience in its behalf. Then there^ 
was the concert feature. This was happily and 
speedily provided for by obtaining the help of 
Alexander the coppersmith and Demetrius tha 
silversmith. It is true, they hated Christ, and 
Paul said that the first had done him much 
harm ; but one sung a good bass and the other 



48 CHTJECH EIS'TEETAINMEIS^TS. 

;a fine tenor ; and they consented to lay aside 
their enmity to the Son of God until the church 
entertainment was over, and sing for his cause. 
But one more voice was needed, and that was 
soon supplied by the town-clerk of Ephesus. 
It was remembered by all how his voice had 
been heard in the day of uproar above thou- 
sands, and so the Ephesian church was well 
satisfied with him as a soprano. No one doubt- 
ed after this that the concert would be a suc- 
cess ; while all joined in praising the beautiful 
spirit of Alexander in consenting to sing bass 
for a church that he hated, and which he pro- 
posed to handle without gloves as soon as he 
finished his song, or the church entertainment 
was through. One more brilliant thing was 
done. Some one reminded the brethren that 
the silver shrine makers of the temple of the 
goddess Diana were a money-making set of 
men. It is true, they were idolaters, and that 
their work in shrines was idolatrous ; but then 
they had money, and it was money the Ephe- 
sian church was after. So a committee was 
dispatched to wait on them ; and in response 
they graciously contributed a purse of their 
gain, and one went so far as to donate a silver 



TWEKTY OBJECT lOIS^S. 49 

shrine of Diana to the church, to be raffled or 
voted for, and the proceeds given to the impe- 
cunious Christians of Ephesus. Did this really 
occur ? Would any one have dreamed of such 
a thing ? Would any one have dared to sug- 
gest such a thing to Paul? If he had, don't 
you know what the man of Grod would have 
said? Don't you know that a holy horror 
would have filled his heart ; that his eye would 
have flashed with a consuming indignation ; 
that love for the church, and jealousy for the 
honor of the Son of God, would have aroused 
every protesting power of his soul; while to 
such a proposition of making money he would 
have uttered the words, '^Thy money perish 
with thee!" 

Yin. 

My eighth objection arises from the utter 
physical exhaustion and demoralization that it 
produces upon the congregation. Just how 
many people have been laid upon beds of sick- 
ness by these affairs would burden the science 
of mathematics to tell. As for the general 
physical effect, you can see for yourself. Look 
at your prayer-meeting or Sunday congrega- 



50 CHUECH ElN'TEKTAIlSrMElSrTS. 

tions the day after the entertainment is over ; 
and it creates the feeling somehow that a cy- 
clone 'had swept through the church. Count 
the empty seats, number the drooping heads, 
the moody faces, the closed eyes ! No need to 
explain to the casual visitor or stranger; he 
knows the meaning of it all, having seen the 
like in his own community or neighborhood. 

IX. 

My ninth objection is, that they are product- 
ive of the most unhappy differences and dissen- 
sions in the congregation. Just to announce a 
church entertainment, is the signal for the first 
division. The spectacle to the world is lament- 
able in the extreme. A congregation that 
should be a unit in Grod's service is here now 
divided into two opposing bodies. Which side 
will the preacher take? By springing the 
question, or permitting it to be sprung, he has 
now two factions in the church, and no matter 
which side he takes, he has now arrayed against 
himself a part of his flock. You say at once, 
''Better never to have a church entertainment. 
Better for the minister to do his utmost to pre- 
vent the occurrence, for this reason if for no 



TWEISTTY OBJECTIOT^S. 51 

other." But this is not the saddest division ; 
there will be divisions in the divisions them- 
selves ; especially in the church entertainment 
workers. 

Some one speaks of the old family feuds in 
the South. They were, I admit, bitter and 
long enduring, but let me tell you I have 
known more rancorous feuds and quarrels than 
these that have arisen at church entertainments. 
Upon a question of gravy and potatoes, or a 
knot of ribbon, or an hour's popularity, indi- 
viduals and families have been betrayed into 
bitterness of spirit and acrimony of remark, 
and finally into widening separations that have 
lasted as long as the lives of the parties them- 
selves. 

X. 

My tenth objection is, that it operates as a 
screen or cloak for the covetousness and avarice 
of many church members. Those that love 
their money better than they do Christ will 
never object to church entertainments. It of- 
fers a double relief to them. One is, that they 
get back the full value of their money in food 
or amusement, so that as a business venture it 



52 CHUECH EIS^TEETAIIS-MENTS. 

is a success. The entertainment saves the man 
from utter financial loss. The other benefit is, 
that by the expenditure of a dollar he obtains 
credit and stands upon a like platform of liber- 
ality with the rest ; whereas if the appeal had 
been made to conscience in the name of the 
the church and God he would have been com- 
pelled to give much more. 

XL 

My eleventh objection to the church enter- 
tainment is, that it shifts the responsibility of 
church support from the congregation to out- 
siders, and hence is a dodge or avoidance of a 
gracious and imperative duty. One would sup- 
pose that in gratitude to him who paid down 
for us ''the gold of his blood and the silver of 
his tears," the church would gladly spend and 
be spent for the support and advancement of 
Christ's kingdom. 

Moreover, the less noble motive would seem 
to affect us, viz., that our coming reward at the 
Judgment will be regulated and graduated by 
the extent of our sacrifices for the Son of God. 
But with many both motives fail, and a duty, 
and privilege as well, is forfeited and trans- 



TWENTY OBJECTIONS. 53 

ierred with all its blessedness to a crowd that 
corresponds with the ''mixed multitude" that 
-€ame up out of Egypt with Moses at the time 
of the Exodus ; a multitude that, if not Egyp- 
tians, were certainly not Israelites. 

XII. 

My twelfth objection is, that it is the sin of 
a, blemished offering. Those of you familiar 
w^ith the Bible will remember God's expressed 
.stipulations in regard to gifts and offerings 
made to him. ISTo physical and moral blemish 
would be allowed. You will remember how 
his indignation flamed out when he declared 
to the Israelites that they had offered him lambs 
upon the altar that were lame and diseased. 

No need to dwell here, but tell me, when peo- 
j)le go up to a church entertainment, ostensibly 
and professedly to lay a gift on God's altar, to 
^contribute to Christ, and God, knowing their 
hearts, sees that they go there to be fed, amused, 
entertained — what is this but a blemished offer- 
ing ? A gift lame and diseased with double 
motive, and consequently an abomination to 
<Jod. 

This is a great time at present for '' Charity 



64 CHURCH EI^TERTAII^MElSrTS. 

Balls," so called. They are as awfully gro- 
tesque and manifestly incongruous as a dance 
or ball that I once heard of that was given to 
build a fence around a graveyard. Who is de- 
ceived in these matters ? Not God ; not even 
the people. It is worldliness breaking out in 
the church, or the world clothing itself in re- 
ligious garments and trying to dance to relig- 
ious music. 

Lately in a certain city we were regaled and 
edified as a Christian community by a number 
of dancing and theatrical performances on the 
stage under the sweet name of ''charity." It 
was a beautiful name they went by, and virtue 
they illustrated ; but it no more covered the 
thorough worldliness of this enterprise, than 
the fig-leaf covered the nakedness of Adam and 
Eve. No one with ordinary intelligence and 
powers of observation could be deceived ; not 
even the participators. One very prominent 
lady of that city said in regard to the affair : 
''I am sick of hearing Kirmess called charity. 
It is not so. No one is attending the perform- 
ances for the sake of charity. We are all go- 
ing there to be amused." Here was a gift laid 
upon the altar. God's attention was called to 



TWEISTTY OBJECTIONS. 55 

it — the givers called it charity. God saw it was 
pure, unadulterated worldliness. It was the 
sin of a blemished offering. 

Just so is the church entertainment. Here 
are people who declare that they have come up 
to give to God, and yet they are people who 
care nothing for God or his cause ; they never 
go out at night to a religious meeting ; they 
are here, not to meet God, but to be fed, amused 
and entertained ; they are here really to gratify 
the eye, the ear, and the palate, although os- 
tensibly and professedly they have come up to 
give to the cause of Christ. I solemnly declare 
the whole thing a mockery ; it is the sin of a 
blemished offering and is an insult to the in- 
telligence, holiness and majesty of heaven. 

XIII. 

My thirteenth objection to the church enter- 
tainment is, that it is the sin of Ananias and 
Sapphira. What was the sin of Ananias and 
his wife? They said they had given all of 
their money when they had only given half. 

What is the sin of the church in these enter- 
tainments ? Plainly this, that it declares that 
its members have given all that they possibly 



56 CHURCH EN'TERTAIJS'MEKTS. 

could, and are now driven to this resort through 
poverty or exhaustion of financial resources, 
when Grod and men know better. Some of us 
need to read that terrible speech of the Al- 
mighty to Ananias that was delivered through 
the lips of Peter : '^ Ananias, why hath Satan 
filled thine heart to lie to the Holy Ghost, and 
to keep back part of the price ? Thou hast not 
lied unto men, but unto Grod." 

I feel perfectly confident that there is not a 
church member in my hearing to-day — or, in- 
deed, in this city — who can say he has done 
all for God in a financial way that he possibly 
could. Hastily a man might say it, but reflect- 
ively he could not. He could not say it when 
the solemn shadows of death were falling about 
him and the soul making ready for its long 
flight; he could not say it at the Judgment 
bar. None of you will be able to face God and 
say, ''Lord, I gave all that I possibly could to 
your cause when I dwelt on earth." See how 
this fact may be proved. In a certain town 
there was a member of our church who had a 
salary of twenty-five hundred dollars a year. 
His annual donation or subscription to the 
church was one hundred dollars ; he used to 



TWEJS^TY OBJECTIONS. 57 

say vehemently that he could not afford to give 
more, that in his contribution he gave all he 
could. But mark you, in the same town resid- 
ed his pastor, with the same sized family, on a 
salary of six hundred dollars per annum, pay- 
ing one hundred dollars for his house rent, and 
yet managing that same year to give to the 
cause of God ninety dollars in cash. Now, 
this pastor will face this member of his flock at 
the day of final accounts, and prove by his life 
and deeds that the brother did not do all that 
he could for the cause of Christ. 

Look again : Some of you are giving a tenth 
of your income ; you say you can do no more ; 
but there are others living in similar circum- 
stances to yourself who give a fifth of their re- 
ceipts to God. Some of you I recognize to 
contribute liberally at the call of the gospel ; 
but there was a certain man named John Wes- 
ley, who not only gave liberally, but after that 
stinted himself in his diet, lived for years on 
one article of food, that through this self-denial 
he might have more to give to God. He will 
at the Judgment convict and silence millions 
who said on earth that they did all they could 
for the gospel. 



58 CHURCH ET^TERTAIISTMEITTS. 

In the light of these facts, I repeat that when 
the church, by one of these entertainments, says^ 
that it has done all that it can do, that it is thus 
forced to appeal to public generosity and char- 
ity, I solemnly affirm that it commits the sin of 
Ananias and Sapphira. The church can do 
more, and more upon the top of that ; not one 
of its members advocating and engineering the 
church fair and supper but feels it in his heart. 
N'or can they appeal to God now ; nor will they 
declare to his face in eternity that they did all 
that they could for him in the gift of their 
money while on earth, no matter how they 
gave, whether spasmodically, systematically, 
or any other way. 

Where does this cry of financial inability 
come from? What individuals or class of 
members is it who are always lamenting the 
poverty of the church, when calls of different 
kinds are made on the congregation? My 
brethren, as I have to give an account for ev- 
ery word I utter, I declare to you that it comes 
from quarters where it should never be uttered. 
The cry of inability to meet the calls of the 
gospel comes, with some rare exceptions, from 
homes where the carpets are thick, and the fur- 



TWENTY OBJECTIOlSrS. 59^ 

niture costly and elegant, where paintings, 
worth hundreds of dollars hang from the walls, 
and where bric-a-brac representing as muck 
crowd the tables and mantel ; where dinners of 
three or four courses are daily occurrences, and 
a trip north for the summer is the annual re- 
laxation. It comes from ladies who possess^ 
diamonds, and from men who walk with gold 
watches ticking in their vest pockets, while 
their broadcloth fairly glistens in the sun. 
These are the ones who say : '' Really, we must 
have an entertainment to help our poor churck 
along. We are so poverty-stricken ourselves 
that we cannot meet these claims. Moreover, 
we have done all that we possibly could." 

*^ Ananias, why hast Satan tempted thee to^ 
lie unto God ! Thou hast not lied unto men^ 
but unto God.'' 

XIV. 

My fourteenth objection to the church enter- 
tainment is, that it involves the church in the 
grossest inconsistency and contradiction. 

The church is set to do— what ? To rebuke 
and warn against worldliness. But the enter- 



60 CHURCH EKTERTAII^MEISTTS. 

tainment opens the floodgates and literally 
submerges the church with worldliness. 

The church is called on to teach men to deny 
the lust of the eye — to crucify the flesh, mor- 
tify our members, subdue the appetites and 
every lust of the flesh. But, oh, marvelous in- 
consistency ! here is the church, through its 
entertainments, inviting men to gaze on the 
spectacular bordering on the theatrical, and 
instead of subduing the appetites, to come up 
and eat and cram and stuff to the glory of God ! 
And the more people stuff, the more money, 
of course, is made, and the better pleased is the 
church ! 

The church is commissioned to inculcate love, 
peace, kindly feelings in the hearts of men. 
See what the entertainment does in this regard ! 
I have already touched upon some of the dis- 
sensions, but permit me to mention another. 
A lady was talking to me a few days since in 
regard to a church fair held some years ago. 
"And oh," she said, "we got two fire compa- 
nies voting against each other for some prize, 
and they got so excited ! and we made so much 
money!" As she talked thus, my head 
drooped with my heart. "And so," I said, 



TWEITTY OBJECTIOlSrS. 61 

"all this money which was given in strife and 
rivalry, and obtained at the cost of wonnded, 
disappointed, mortified hearts, this was offered 
to Christ !" I could say no more. My whole 
soul was grieved at such an inconsistent, con* 
tradictory, suicidal course of action. 

I then thought of another entertainment, 
where a stick or gown or something else was 
set up, and two congregations tried to outvote 
each other at so much a vote, in order to cap- 
ture or win it for their respective pastors. 

I thought of an old couplet I heard when L 
was a boy : 

" I bet my money on the bob-tail nag, 
And who dare bet on the bay ?" 

I saw the two excited flocks voting early and 
often ; I recall a line of the hoary past : " See 
how these Christians love one another !" I see 
one brother warming up in his holy liberality, 
he grows more and more generous — to whom ? 
to Grod ? Why, Gfod is not thought of, nor his 
kingdom ; the man is simply growing liberal 
and generous to a fixed purpose of his mind ; 
and that is to have that stick for his preacher. 
Oh, beautiful Christian liberality ! By and by 
the momentous question is decided, and the 



€2 CHURCH EISTTERTAIKMEKTS. 

«tick, or rod, now become a serpent, is handed 
over to the winning congregation. Passing 
over the pangs of defeat and chagrin felt by 
the losers, I listen and catch the remarks made 
by lookers-on : Mr. So-and-So's congregation 
liked him a great deal better than Dr. Blank's 
congregation liked him. This, of course, adds 
much to the general sweetness of spirit that 
marks the occasion. And out of all this the 
Son of God is to be glorified ! 

XV. 

My fifteenth objection to the church enter- 
tainment is, that it is purely worldly in char- 
acter. 

However spiritual the object and however 
laudable the motive of the originators of the 
enterprise may be, the entertainment itself is 
worldly. Some are less so than others, but the 
taint is on them all. The leprosy may only 
appear as a spot in the forehead, but a single 
spot according to the Word of God is leprosy. 
A person has only to read the advertisements, 
and even hear the names of the various kinds 
of church shows and sociables, to detect their 
spirit and character. 



TWEIS-TY OBJECTIOiN'S. 63 

In a certain town in Texas, on the border 
line, an entertainment was given in behalf of 
the Young Men's CTiristian Association, con- 
sisting of a Bull-Fight ! Think of suffering 
and agony inflicted upon dumb animals at such 
a time — and reconcile such a proceeding with 
the advancement of the kingdom of Christ that 
teaches good will to man and mercy to the 
brute world ! 

Here is a clipping in regard to a church on 
Long Island : 

*' A church on Long Island, N. Y., has got a first-class ad- 
Tertisement in the daily papers by holding an entertainment 
in which a novel method was adopted for raising money. A 
handsome tent was erected, on the outside of which was post- 
ed the following notice : * Admission five cents. To kiss the 
Tjaby, twenty-five cents.' The 'babies' were young ladies, 
with which the tent was liberally supplied. A large amount 
of money was raised, but the whole community was scandal- 
ized." 

At another church we read of ladies going to 
the festival hall with baskets filled with lunch- 
eons. The ladies were weighed and the gen- 
tlemen had to pay for the luncheon according 
to the weight of the lady at the rate of a cent 
a pound. All this was of course profoundly 
edifying, and of course calculated to fill a scoff- 



64 CHUECH EISTTERTAIKMEIS'TS. 

ing, skeptical world with reverence and admi- 
ration for such a church ! 

We give another clipping, taken from a 
church paper : 

**At the festival of the King's Daughters, which begins^ 
next Wednesday evening, instead of a caricature on ballet 
dancing, as was originally intended to be given, there will be 
a humorous take-off on the Delsarte system by the same gen- 
tlemen. A pretty little girl will execute a fancy dance. The^ 
little lady is quite an adept at dancing, and will, doubtless, 
prove a favorite. A well known humorist has volunteered to^ 
act as the Showman in the 'Arabian Nights' entertainment, 
and will introduce and explain the characters in his happiest 
vein, full of fun and with plenty of new jokes and comical 
sayings. A composer of music has a number of new songs 
which he has written especially for the occasion. They are 
said to be very bright and * catchy,* and will lend an addi- 
tional charm to the entertainment." 

Comment is unnecessary. 

We give a clipping that bears on the proceed- 
ings of another religious denomination than 
our own. We offer no remark, but give it as 
it appeared in print. This is the denomination 
that claims to be the true church. If they be 
true, what is to become of those who are false ? 

*' The /. G. B. U, Journal, of recent date, has the following :: 

" ' SODALITIES AND ST. LOUIS. 

" * T7ie Sodalist of Cincinnati says the Sodalities of that city 
ought to imitate the example which the Sodalities of St. Louis 
give, and adds, ** A great deal is yet to be done by the Cin- 
cinnati Sodalities before they can stand comparison with St.. 
Louis.' 



TWET^TY OBJECTIOIS-S. 65 

" 'How, we do not discover. 

*' ' Here is what we know lately occurred in St. Louis : A 
Sodality gave a play, ** a rude tragedy," on Sunday, followed 
hj a ball, and a saloon in full sway in the basement. Anoth- 
er Sodality prepared for Lent by giving a ball in an unfin- 
ished church. The pastor said '* it was the best attended hop 
-ever given in the parish." 

** 'If Sodalities in Cincinnati and St. Louis are the same 
Mnd of a thing, they differ very much from what are called 
Sodalities in Philadelphia. 

'* ' On a St. Louis church door was lately posted an account 
of the receipts from a recent festival. One item read : * ' Re- 
ceived from the bar, $42.75." 

" ' Beer was the chief drink sold at that festival, though the 
Council of Baltimore prohibited rum-selling by churches.'" 

The beer-drinking feature brings to mind an 
occurrence of a similar nature in an Episcopal 
church in New Orleans. To the honor of the 
pastor, be it said that he solemnly protested 
against such a thing as beer-selling and beer- 
drinking as a financial resort of the church — 
but the protest led to his removal from the 
charge as pastor. He was hardly worldly 
enough for some of his members. 

Here is another, taken from a daily paper 
published in a large Southern city. It is about 
a Methodist church : 

* * * Cupid's Freaks. ' For the Benefit of the New First 
Methodist Church, Friday, March 6, at the Lyceum 

Theater.— This production, under the direction of Miss G 

L , will be the amateur affair of the season. It will con- 
sist of very beautiful tableaux, a tambourine drill, the min. 



66 CHURCH ENTERTAINMEIS^TS. 

net, pantomimic posing, several recitations and vocal selec- 
tions by gifted artists. The rehearsal last Saturday gave as a 
foretaste of a rare treat. 

" The box sheet for sale of reserved seats opens this morn- 
ing at 9 o'clock at the Lyceum Theater. Those who have al- 
ready purchased tickets may exchange them for reserved 
seats. All the boxes have been engaged by prominent society 
people." 

Let Methodist people everywhere who love 
Christ, and honor his church, stress certain 
words in the above extract ; for instance, the 
words minuet, pantomimic posing, box sheet, 
reserved seats, tickets, boxes, Lyceum Theater, 
and prominent society people. As you read, 
answer the question— Where are we drifting ? 
or, rather. Where have we landed ? Has the 
world come to us, or have we gone to the 
world ? 

But this is not all of that remarkable enter- 
tainment ; we give more, as it appeared in the 
daily papers. Much more could be added, but 
we content ourselves with the following ex- 
tracts : 

" * Cupid's Freaks,' as presented by an army of lovely 

young ladies under the direction of Miss G L , is an 

entertainment that is delightful and pleasing from first to last. 
The entire performance was so well rendered that it would 
take a host of staid judges to decide the excellence of the one 

over the other. Little Miss E F , in her recitations, 

won the most applause by her winsome and childish manner, 



TWEISTTY OBJECTIONS. 67 

so entirely free from affectation. After her recitation, ' Chick- 
en Talk,' she was recalled twice. The tambourine drill was 
one of the prettiest numbers on the programme. * * * * 

'* Miss recited ' The Prettiest Girl ' in a manner to gain 

generous applause. 

"Miss proved herself a clever actress in the monologue 

* After Her Heart.' She was recalled and received many bas- 
kets of flowers. 

' ' The scene shifted and Miss sang a gypsy song, * Mer- 
rily I Roam,' beating the while her castanets and gayly danc- 
ing. 

" 'St. Valentine's Revenge,* first on the programme, was 
personated as follows : 

St. Valentme Miss 

Queen of Hearts Miss 

Maiden Miss 

Messengers Misses , 

Cupids Misses , 

*' * Cleonis's Studio' was filled with the following beautiful 
figures ; 

"Vanity" Miss 

** Modesty" Miss 

"Ophelia" Miss 

"Psyche and Cupid " . . . .Misses , 

"Hebe " Miss 

"Indifference and Sympathy" 

Misses , 



''The statues had wonderful fortitude and remained appa- 
rently motionless, while Miss recited the beautiful but 

somewhat lengthy selection, ' Marble Dream. ' 

" ' Cupid's Dancing Lesson' is a pretty tableau, in which 
Miss and Miss are the musicians, to whose music lit- 
tle Miss , as Cupid, poses in the attitude of dancing. 

**'Zekle's Courtship,' a tableau vivant, was laughable in 
the extreme. Miss was the reader, and the actors were : 

Zekle Mr 

Huldy Miss 

Ma Miss 

Parson Doolittle Mr 

Charity Sniffles Miss 



68 CHURCH EN"TERTAI]SrME]S^TS. 



Debby Slocum Miss 

Deacon Elderberry Mr 

******* 

" The shadow pantomime, acting the ballad of ' Mary Jane,' 

was well carried out. Miss read the poem while the 

others followed in action. The personations were : 



Mary Jane Miss 

Ben?aniin Mr. 

Father Mr. 

Lord Mortimer Mr. 

Reader Miss . . . . 



* * Through all the Lyceum orchestra played in its own ex- 
quisite fashion, accompanied by Miss on the piano, a 

diflSlcult task that was performed with grace and skill 

**The closing scene, a pantomimic posing minuet, was the 
picture of beauty and graceful motion, and was frequently 
applauded. The young ladies were costumed in flowing 
robes of creamy white and carried heart-shaped silver fans 
outlined by pink flowers. ******* 

'' The entertainment was greatly enjoyed throughout by 
one of the largest audiences ever assembled in the house. The 
performance will be repeated to-day at a matinee." 

After reading the above programme the mind 
is confused in the effort to discover where the 
church appears in this matter. In the words 
of a certain Christian paper may be found the 
proper explanation : 

** Either the church or the theater have changed, for they 
are harmonizing in many places. From the showbills we see 
posted in public places, we cannot believe there is any change 
in the theater." 

We conclude this point with one other no- 
tice, of a famous entertainment given in behalf 
of two protestant churches in one of our larg- 



TWEIS'TY OBJECTIOIS^S. 69 

est cities. The handbill begins with the words 
* ' Announcement Extraordinary ! " — and so 
it is. 

AnISTOUNCEMENT EXTRAORDmARY ! 

Thursday and Friday Evenings and Saturday Matinee, 
February 26th, 27th and 28th. 

Professor John W. Sherman's 
Wonderful 

PHANTASMA! 

Under the auspices of the Ladies of 



A Novel, Unique and Elegant Entertainment, which has met 

with phenomenal success, and won the unqualified 

endorsements of Pulpit, Press and Public in 

San Francisco, Denver and Kansas City. 

Artistic Tableaux. Beautiful Illusions. 

Enchanting Music. 

Allegorical. Classical. Historical. 

Acknowledged by all cities the most charming and mysterious 

Spectacular and Scenic Effects ever produced 

on any stage. 

Groups of Living Figures Transformed in every 
Conceivable Manner. 
Appearing and Disappearing at Will. 

Living People Vanishing in Air. 

The Programme will be varied by 

YocAL and Instrumental Music of the Best Local Talent. 

A variety of wealth and worth that must be seen to 

be appreciated, all under the superintendence of 

Professor John W. Sherman, 

Inventor and Patentee of the Phantasma. 

Admission 50 Cents. Reserved Seats 25 Cents Extra. 

Matinee, Tickets for Children, 25 Cents. 

Tickets for sale at 



70 CHUKCH EISTTERTAIKMEIS'TS. 

In order to get at the full moral effect of this 
*' unique" entertainment, let the reader trans- 
port himself to Jerusalem in the time of the 
apostles. The church in the city of David is 
thought to be financially languishing. Joseph 
of Arimatha and Mcodemus, both members 
and stewards as well, have announced that they 
would give no more. That although they were 
both men of great wealth, they did not pro- 
pose to be forever giving. Let the laboring 
classes learn to give. They themselves have 
given one hundred shekels apiece (equal to one 
hundred dollars), besides subscribing to the 
support of the poor widows in Judea — and 
could spare no more. The ladies and the finan- 
cial steward of the church of Jerusalem were 
in desperation. It was at this critical moment 
thev heard of the wonderful deeds of Simon 
the Sorcerer, in Samaria. Some one suggested 
that a messenger be sent to engage his services 
in a kind of magical and necromantic show or 
entertainment. Half the proceeds were to go 
to Simon and the other to the church in Jeru- 
salem. John Mark, always great at running, 
was sent to see him, and in due time returned 
with the Samaritan Conjurer. The upper room, 



TWEISTTY OBJECTIOT^S. 71 

where the Holy Ghost had fallen, was engaged, 
and the handbills appeared. Now let the 
reader substitute the name of Prof. Simon, the 
Sorcerer, for Prof. John W. Sherman, and Je- 
Tusalem for the blank church on the handbill, 
and then see how it reads. 

As the shocked feeling goes over one as such 
a thing takes place, let the writer ask the ques- 
tion. Why should it be any more horrifying 
and culpable in the times of the disciples than 
In the present time ? A proceeding that is mor- 
ally wrong in the first century is a sin still in 
the nineteenth century. The idea that God 
would receive and bless such an entertainment 
in apostolic days is no more absurd than to be- 
lieve that he would look upon and bless such 
^n exhibition now. Time does not and cannot 
regenerate. 

XVI. 

My sixteenth objection to the church enter- 
liainment is, that its educational tendencies are 
evil. 

It is remarkable that the very things most 
earnestly forbidden its members by the church 
Jiave their beginnings and approximations in 



72 CHURCH El^TERTAIKMEl^TS. 

the entertainment. The church tells me I must 
not go to the theater and other places of world- 
ly amusement; but the entertainment says^ 
^*Come to me and I will give you very muck 
the same, only under another and softer name." 
The church forbids my gambling, and warns 
me against the lottery ; but the entertainment 
says in lieu of this, '^I will let you indulge in 
raflflies, the grab bag, or the recent feature of 
voting, which is only a mild form of a game of 
chance." Who wonders that our children are 
found in places of worldly amusement, when 
we are all the time educating them in this di- 
rection, giving them, ourselves, a taste and rel- 
ish for such things ! Who wonders that after 
we have blunted their spiritual sensibilities, 
and familiarized their minds to such a life by^ 
contact with the more refined forms of worldli- 
ness in the church, to find them afterwards 
perfectly content and at home with the coarser- 
forms of worldliness outside the church ! There^ 
is a young man in the penitentiary of Ohio to- 
day, placed there for some crime committed as- 
a gambler, who says he is there from the influ- 
ence and effect on his character of church en- 
tertainments. He says ''that he was so lucky^ 



TWEKTY OBJECTIONS. 7^ 

in all the grabbing and raflle performances of 
the clinrcli, that on entering life as a young 
man, he discovered a relish and thirst awak- 
ened in him for things of that character ; and. 
it occurred to him that as he had been so fort- 
unate in church raflles, he would be equally 
successful in cards, lotteries, etc." And so he^ 
embarked in the life of a gambler ; then came^ 
a crime as a gambler ; and then the peniten- 
tiary. Oh, church of the living, holy God, 
how glorious has your work become ! The^ 
drift, or educative tendency, of the church en- 
tertainment, I emphatically repeat, is toward, 
evil, and to greater evils all the while. In a 
certain church in the West, not of our denom- 
ination I am glad to say, it was resolved to 
raise some funds to push on the work of tha 
gospel. The idea of a supper was hooted at, 
that being too tame. Something new, interest-^ 
ing and crowd-drawing was needed, and so the 
marvelous spectacle was beheld of a saloon in. 
one corner of the hall, where drinks of alco-^ 
holic nature were sold for so much, and in the^ 
other corner was a billiard table, run also in. 
the interests of the church ! All this moneys 
was to push the gospel on in its victorious way t 



74 CHURCH ENTERTAIISTMEIS^TS. 



To the most objectionable forms of social evil 
and worldly practices does the church enter- 
tainment naturally gravitate. Look at its 
double life and spirit and judge for yourselves : 
its spiritual parentage, so to speak. On one 
side it is nothing but an ecclesiastical money 
dodge ; on the other a pure spirit of worldli- 
ness. What may you expect of such a child ? 
Will it not go into evil think you ? There is 
but one thing that can keep it in check, and 
that is a strong public Christian sentiment. 
May God send it, and that quickly ! There is 
but one thing that can utterly banish it, and 
that is the coming of Christ into the church as 
he once came, cleansed, and took possession of 
rthe Temple. 

XVII. 

My seventeenth objection to the church en- 
tertainment is, that it entails financial loss up- 
on the church. 

''What!" you say, '^we thought we made 
money by it ?" To this I reply that the enter- 
tainment is what could properly be called a 
penny-wise and pound-foolish proceeding. It 
brings in scores of dollars, but it loses hundreds 



TWEl^TY OBJECTIOIN'S. 75 

r»i i — - 

and thousands. And this it does in two ways : 
First, by the entertainment plan you are edu- 
cating the young generation not to give. In- 
stead of teaching our young people that it is 
their privilege and duty to give, and training 
them to give from principle, and systematically, 
we are here paying them to give ; we are brib- 
ing them, coaxing them with charades and tab- 
leaux, and concerts, and berries, and cream, to 
give to Christ, their Maker, Redeemer, Bene- 
factor, and Judge. The attitude of our young 
people to-day is just this — ''Before I give to 
the church you must sing me a song, or give 
me a saucer of ice cream!" Look for your- 
selves and see. Where are the princely givers 
of the church ? As they die no one is taking 
their place. I know of but two young men in 
this city who deserve to be called liberal. But, 
mark you, I don't blame our young people so 
much for this ; but I blame the church. It is 
the church that has educated them not to give. 
The other way in which the entertainment 
entails financial loss upon the church is seen in 
the wrong line of approach it adopts in appeal- 
ing to the liberality of church members. There 
are many people who will dodge behind a fifty 



76 CHUBCH EISTTEETAINMEI^TS. 

cent ticket of admission to a church, festival, 
or claim to have done liberal things by eating 
a saucer of ice cream, and go off tranquil in 
mind and self-satisfied ; vrhen if the appeal for 
help had been made on the line of conscience, 
and in the name of the Son of God, there would 
have been fifty dollars in the treasury instead 
of fifty cents. My brethren, the profound mis- 
take of the church is seen in working with the 
human stomach — the moral nature does not re- 
side there. The work of the church is with 
man's conscience — may she not forget it — for 
there is to be her great achievement and stu- 
pendous victory. I might also mention how 
much the entertainment loses to the church by 
grieving and disgusting many conscientious 
and spiritually-minded people, who feel that 
the whole thing is wrong and so draw off and 
have nothing to do with the entire matter. Let 
me give you one instance. I know of a certain 
congregation that had concluded to erect a new 
house of worship. A gentleman well to do, 
thinking it was to be erected through the vol- 
untary gifts of the people quietly resolved to 
bring up a thousand dollars. To his unspeak- 
able disgust, before the Christian community 



TWEISTTY OBJECTIONS. 77 

had been approached for the amoTint that 
would have been easily raised, a church enter- 
tainment was inaugurated. He quietly drew 
out and had nothing more to do with the mat- 
ter. The entertainment realized some hun- 
dreds of dollars, but lost a thousand from one 
individual. It is, I repeat, a penny-wise and 
pound-foolish business ; and if the church, 
while counting its dimes and dollars, could on- 
ly see the hundreds and thousands that might 
have been hers, she would open her eyes in as- 
tonishment, and give up her method, and take 
God's plan instead, which has ever been, and 
will ever be, the best, world without end ! 

I repeat, that as a financial plan the church 
entertainment is a failure. Has not the reader 
noticed that the churches that most abound in 
this method are always in debt ? I recall a 
certain church in this city that invested twenty 
dollars in a festival and took in three ; net loss 
seventeen dollars. At another church in the 
same city the congregation secured at consider- 
able outlay the presence of a famous preacher 
and lecturer, hired an expensive hall, and lost 
three hundred dollars by the operation. They 
had expected to make one or two thousand. 



78 CHURCH ENTERTAIKMEISTTS. 

Viewed in every light, the church entertain- 
ment as a financial method for caring for God's 
honse and cause is worse than a failure. 

XVIII. 

My eighteenth objection to the church enter- 
ment is, that it entails spiritual loss upon the 
church, by destroying the lines and distinctions 
which God has drawn between the church and 
the world. 

God wants his church to be a perfect contrast 
to the world ; as clear and distinct indeed as 
light from darkness. In that separation and 
difference will be the beauty, strength and glo- 
ry of the church. Let me assure you, breth- 
ren, that if a pure woman would lift up a fallen 
creature of her own sex, she will never do it 
by becoming corrupt herself. It takes purity 
to lift up impurity. And so, if the church is 
ever to make the world better, and lift it into 
godliness, it will never be by becoming like the 
world. There is a fearful picture drawn in one 
of the prophets, where a certain powerful and 
wicked king had died, and as his soul descend- 
ed to perdition, the Book says all hell was 
stirred and rose up to meet him at his coming, 



TWENTY OBJECTIOlSrS. 79^ 

crying out at the same time : ''0, thou son of 
the morning, how hast thou fallen, and hecome 
like unto us /" Do you know that is the cry 
of the world to-day about us ? The judgment 
passed on the church by thousands is, that she 
is like the world. That you cannot tell a 
church member from a man of the world. If 
you would listen you would hear the world 
laughing at us. We could endure it if we- 
were innocent. I hear much of it as I go about. 
It is the same derisive, horrible laugh, the same^ 
fearful welcoming cry that rose up from hell : 
^^How hast thou fallen, O thou church of God, 
thou child of the morning — thou hast become 
like unto us!" 

In the church entertainment we lower all ap- 
proaches, rub out lines and demarkations, and 
put the gap very low. ^'Come in," we say ta 
the world ; ''how much alike we are, after all ! 
You thought I was so holy, but I am not holy ; 
I am just like you ; only come in and see how 
much alike we are !" And so through the low 
gap the world comes in ; but, alas for us, some- 
thing goes out from us that is indescribable, 
and the loss of which is irreparable. That 
beautiful, indefinable heavenly grace, that 



W CHUECH ElS^TEETAIl^TMElSrTS. 

i\rondrous force and spiritual power that comes 
to the church from spotlessness and unbending 
integrity, and separation from the spirit and 
ways of the world — that goes and leaves us 
poor indeed. Isn't it strange that it does not 
occur to the farmer, that when he sets his gap 
low in order that his neighbor's sheep might 
oome in and be appropriated, that through that 
same gap he may lose his own ? 

There was a certain minister of another relig- 
ious denomination who determined to set his 
^ap very low ; he determined that as the world 
would not come up to the church, he would bring 
the church down to the world. In a sermon 
preached in his pulpit a few months ago, he 
stated to his hearers that after coming to the 
church at the morning service and worshiping, 
that they were free to spend the rest of the 
Sabbath as they would — in sailing, riding, base- 
balling, and other ways of relaxation and rec- 
reation. To his amazement, he failed to get a 
single worldly man to join his church by this 
religion-made-easy plan. The fact is, men do 
dot take to such a church. When they change 
they want something different; there is no 
sense in going from the world to the world. 



TWENTY OBJECTIOlSrS. 8l 

So, I say, that lie gained no one by his low 
gap ; on the contrary, he lost one of his most 
valuable members. Naturally, that member 
was shocked and pained at such teachings, and 
so immediately left that fold and sought an- 
other church and preacher where he could hear 
doctrines more in accord with the truth of the 
Bible. The conclusion is that there is nothing 
to be gained but everything lost by any com- 
promise with, or approximation to, the world. 
When we come into any relation with the 
world, except that taught in God's Word, it 
means loss of members, loss of respect, and loss 
of that peculiar virtue and power by which we 
can alone uplift and save men. 

In the church entertainment we are called 
upon to notice a very remarkable fellowship. 
Here are people mingling with and working 
with Christians who hate God, hate the Sab- 
bath, hate the church, deny the Bible, and re- 
fuse to believe in the divinity of our Lord Je- 
sus Christ. A certain Christian lady was ex- 
patiating to me in glowing terms upon this 
lovely intimacy ! ^^Oh," she said, ^^we have 
such beautiful Christian fellowship !" '' Chris- 
tian fellowship !" I said. '^Do yon call this 



82 CHURCH EKTERTAIISTMEIS^TS. 

affinity you have made with people who say 
that your Savior is a fraud, liar and imposter 
— do you call that Christian fellowship ?" 

I remember something in the Old Testament 
of a similar nature, where a certain king who 
knew and served God made affinity with a king 
who hated God and served him not. He had 
hardly begun the strange, unnatural inti- 
macy, when suddenly a prophet sent of God 
stood before him, and with solemn face and 
more solemn words said: ''Thus saith the 
Lord, Do ye love them that hate the Lord? 
Tiierefore, evil is come upon thee from the 
Lord!" 

In the Book of Genesis appears another re- 
markable fellowship. " It came to pass," says 
the Bible, "that the sons of God saw the daugh- 
ters of men, and took them wives of all which 
they chose." My only remark here is, that it 
was just after this God repented that he had 
made man ; and, grieved at the universal wick- 
edness, sent a deluge to destroy the entire race. 

We have nothing to expect from any kind of 
affinity or amalgamation with the world, but 
the loss of God's favor, and our own final over- 
throw and ruin. May heaven keep us far and 



TWEIS^TY OBJECT lOJSrS. 83 

Jorever from it ! But certainly when we see 
the church and the world socially and morally 
one, when they can work side by side in a com- 
mon religious, or rather Irreligious, enterprise, 
it means that history is repeating itself, that 
the people of God and of the world have amal- 
gamated, are at peace, and that any day we 
may look for the sweeping judgments of the 
Head of the Church. 

XIX. 

My nineteenth objection to the church enter- 
tainment is, that it robs the pulpit of its force 
and the church of its rebuking power. 

We all know the stress God lays on the re- 
proving power of the church; she ''must cry 
aloud and spare not"; she "must declare the 
sins of the people". The effect of the rebuk- 
ing and warning voice of the church is to awak- 
en sleeping consciences, form a healthy public 
opinion and sentiment, and be a bulwark be- 
tween men and all encroachments of evil. We 
all know very well that reproof draws its great 
power from blamelessness and purity of life. 
For instance, who pays attention to the reproof 
of a bad man or woman ? Who cares for the 



84 CHUKCH E]S"TERTAI]SrME]S^TS. 

judgment of one full of faults and inconsisten- 
cies ? It is the pure alone who are tolerated 
and hearkened to when it comes to reproof. 
Now, if the church becomes assimilated to the 
world, is diflEerent indeed only by a few delicate 
shades of moral coloring, how will she be able 
to uplift her voice against the iniquity that is 
in the world ? How can the pew and pulpit 
speak against the theater, when we have things 
so much like it in our shows and festivals? 
How can the church denounce gambling and 
the lottery when she has the grab-bag and raffle 
and ''voting" within her sacred walls, and 
meeting with her smiling approval ? The whole 
effect is to paralyze the tongue of preacher and 
layman in the presence of the great evils of the 
day. 

In the church entertainment the direct as- 
sault and main expectation is from men of the 
world. The church wants their unsanctified 
dollars. Have you noticed at such times who 
are the most liberal contributors ? They are 
men representing vocations and pursuits that 
are wrong. Not always legally wrong, but 
morally so. Now, why is it that the man of 
cards, or of the saloon, or of the race-track, or 



TWENTY OBJECTIONS. 85 

of the lottery, will always give at such times, 
and whenever the church forgets her heavenly 
birth and high calling so far as to ask money 
at their hands ? God tells you in the Book of 
Proverbs : '' It is because they know that a gift 
pacifieth ; and that it will, when received, take 
the reproof from the tongue of the reprover." 
They know the psychological effect of dollars ; 
they know how their gifts will fling a soften- 
ing atmosphere around their wrong lives and 
pursuits, while, at the same time, the hearts of 
the benefitted congregation will relax and re- 
lent ; and they will say, looking kindly upon 
their donors: ''Let us not judge our fellow 
creatures any more ; who are we that we should 
judge any man !" All of which is very true, 
especially the last sentence commencing ''who 
are we?" I tell you, my brethren, that the 
last day will reveal to you, that the secret of 
the liberality of the wrong business and pur- 
suit is to secure the tolerance of a Christian 
community, and gag the tongue of a Christian 
people, and paralyze the Christian pen. Men 
know the tremendous power that lies in the re- 
{proof of a holy church, and they know the dis- 
arming, silencing power of a gift received ; and 



86 CHURCH ElSTTERTAINMEl^TS. 

SO fchey give and will continue to give. There 
is a gambling institution in this city,^ whose 
baleful corrupting influence is felt all over the 
land. It is a running sore and eating cancer to 
the financial and moral prosperity of our com- 
munity ; and yet this institution never fails to 
give to every good cause in the land, and was 
never known to refuse liberal donations to 
churches of all denominations. It is done, not 
for the love of God, but to produce silence in 
the church, and perpetuate its own existence. 
And it does both of these things. God know» 
that if the church would arise in the majesty 
of heavenly rebuke, with the lightning of a 
holy indignation in her eye, that men would 
not seek in a Christian land to corrupt, make 
gamblers and drunkards of our children. If 
she would confront them with God's truth in 
her life and lips, as did Christ in the Temple, 
there are a thousand evils now in this city that 
would slink at once into the darkness where 
they properly belong, and never lift their heads, 
again. But when the church places itself un- 
der obligation to these evil pursuits and insti- 
tutions ; when she receives money from their 

*New Orleans. 



TWENTY OBJECTIONS. 87 

hands, how is she going to rebuke them ? She 
cannot. Indeed her reception of the gift is a 
virtual endorsement. For a mess of pottage 
she has sold her birthright! She expresses 
horror at the act of Judas in selling Christ for 
thirty pieces of silver ; but, at the same time, 
tarns herself about and sells Christ's honor be- 
fore the world, the purity of the church, and 
the rebuking power of the church, for the same 
shining, perishing metal. But you say, ' ' Mon- 
ey is money. All money is the same — one 
man's money is as good as another's." I beg 
your pardon, but this is not so. He that no- 
ticed the two mites that fell into the treasury, 
and commended the gift, and said nothing of 
the bullion going in, declared by that act that 
all money is not the same. The giver gives 
character to the gift. Nor is this all. He that 
said in the Bible that ''the hire of a harlot of- 
fered in the Temple was an abomination to 
him," declared in that speech that all money 
is not the same. A five dollar bill coming from 
one person, and a five dollar bill coming from 
another of different life and character, are as 
different in the sight of God as good and evil 
themselves. I tell you, my brethren, from all 



88 CHURCH EITTERTAHS-MElNrTS. 

I can gather of the nature and acts of God in 
this book, I feel safe in saying that the God of 
Truth and Love, and Mercy and Justice, will 
never accept money offered to him that has the 
tears of the widow and orphan upon it, and 
that if wrung in your hands would actually 
drip with human agony, and the blood of souls. 
My brother of a different denomination, what- 
ever you be, if ever I worship in your house, 
church, or cathedral, please let me sit in my 
pew and lean my head against the bricks, or 
stone, or plank, that have been paid for by the 
loving, voluntary gifts of God's dear children ; 
I think I will feel better, enjoy myself more. 
Don't put any one near that section of wall 
paid for by money made in illegal and immoral 
ways. I am sure they would be uncomforta- 
ble all the while ; they would all the while 
during the service fancy they heard the rattle 
of dice, the shuffling of cards, the low swish of 
the lottery wheel, the dripping of tears, the 
cries of women and the spurt of blood. Put 
them somewhere else, and place several light- 
ning rods on that part of the building, for if 
ever the electric bolt does fall, I rather think 
it will strike just about there. 



TWEKTY OBJECTIOIN^S. 89 

XX. 

My twentieth objection to the church enter- 
tainment is grounded on the fact of the gene- 
ral testimony against it. 

First of all, the whole spirit and teaching 
and example of Scripture is against it. For 
argument's sake, I would be willing to admit 
for a moment that it was not an evil. And 
still the Bible condemns it. Say that it is no 
evil, but the last one of you will admit that it 
has the appearance of evil. Now, what says 
the Scripture % ''Abstain from all appearance 
of evil." This one verse wipes out the church 
entertainment from beginning to end. 

Again, I have never talked with ministers or 
laymen on this subject but the vast majority 
condemned the thing in toto^ while those most 
active in the church festival business admitted 
to me that they felt it was not the best way to 
raise money for the gospel. Now, my breth- 
ren, the church of the Son of God has nothing 
to do with any but the best ways. We cannot 
afford to touch or have anything to do with 
financial methods and entertainments that have 
any doubt resting upon them, or can be ques- 
tioned by spiritually-minded people, much less 



90 CHURCH ENTEETAIJ^MEISTTS. 

by the world itself. God have mercy on ns as 
a church when we do things that even the 
world out of Christ condemns ! 

Again, the entire religious press of our 
church and other denominations are opposed 
to it. How many articles I have read in our 
New Orleans Christian Advocate against it ! 
Who does not remember the calm, clear and 
faithful warnings that fell from the editorial 
pen of Bishop Parker % While only lately in 
the columns of the Nashville Advocate — our 
general church organ — there was written by 
its assistant editor as faithful and solemn a 
warning against the identical spirit and prac- 
tice as I ever read. I wonder how you can 
nerve yourself up to do a thing against whick 
is directed the editorial opposition and con- 
demnation of our entire church. 

Still, again, I notice that large religious bod- 
ies have pronounced against it. Conferences,, 
synods, assemblies, associations and conven- 
tions have all recognized and branded it as an 
evil. Only a few months since, in the city of 
Chicago, there assembled a convention of sev- 
eral hundred ministers of different religious 
denominations. Among other things they did. 



TWEISTTY OBJECTIOlSrS. 91 

they expressed themselves emphatically and 
unmistakably on the subject of church enter- 
tainments. Do you know what they called it? 
Please remember it, for it was just true and 
thoroughly descriptive. They branded it ' ' The^ 
Cooking- Stove Apostasy of the Nineteenth 
Century!" 

Oh, my brethren, there was a time I thought, 
of the church robed in spotless white, and mov- 
ing through the nations with uplifted, trans- 
figured countenance, love in her eyes, the per-- 
fume of holiness about her person, and scatter- 
ing blessings constantly from her hand. But 
there is a sad change. There have been thought- 
less hands who have stripped her of her spirit- 
ual glory, and otherwise altered her, so that: 
she either stands posing before the world in the^ 
tinsel attire and half-learned attitudes of a sec- 
ond-rate theater ; or she moves through the 
land with the rumpled, frowsy, heated, greasy 
appearance of the kitchen upon her, and dis- 
tributing from her garments the smell of poor- 
ly- fried oysters and mildewed chicken salad 
wherever she goes. 

The true method of giving — what is it ? There 
is but one way recognized and accepted of God. 



92 CHUECH EI^TEETAIlSTMElSrTS. 

I first notice it in the Mosaic times. ''Speak 
to the children of Israel, that they bring me an 
offering." What were the offerings? Sub- 
istances of value, gold, silver, brass and precious 
stones. No one was allowed to dodge behind 
some corporeal service and call that an offering. 
*' Every one," says the Scripture, "offered an 
offering of gold unto the Lord." 

In the kingly times of Israel I see the meth- 
od again. Turn to Second Kings, twelfth 
chapter and ninth verse: "But Jehoiada the 
priest took a chest and bored a hole in the lid 
of it, and set it beside the altar ; and the priests 
that kept the door put therein all the money 
that was brought into the house of the Lord." 

You notice that it is always money ! Why? 
TN^ot because God loves money, but because he 
sees you do. He knows, as some of you do, 
that there are many people in the church who 
are willing to do anything for the Lord — but 
.give him their money. I verily believe they 
"would walk the streets in behalf of the church 
until their tongues protruded ; they would fry 
oysters all through the silent watches of the 
night until they dropped in their tracks ex- 
hausted next morning; they would do any- 



TWEl^TY OSJECTIOJN-S. 95 

thing, everything, rather than give their money 
to God ! And, by the way, this class consti- 
tutes the most active element among church 
entertainment workers. But God will not be 
satisfied with this. The dearest idol, deepest 
love, must be sacrificed for him. He knows of 
that money-love in the human heart. He is 
determined to break it up, and awaken that 
loving, liberal, generous nature that will re- 
spond to every call that he makes. And so he 
says: ''Bring an offering of gold; bring me 
the most precious of metals ; give me the rec- 
ognized standard of value ; lay money, your 
money, not another man's money, not the 
world's money, but your money, upon my al- 
tar !" In the time of Christ I see God's meth- 
od still. It is mentioned in the text, ''Jesus 
sat over against the treasury," and saw it in 
successful operation. Rich and poor were 
casting in their gold and silver. No church 
fair or entertainment in sight, or even thought 
of. Everybody was giving voluntarily to the 
Lord. In the times of the apostles the method 
was still working. Many things had been 
changed. Circumcision had given way to bap- 
tism, and the Passover had been substituted 



94 CHUECH El^TERTAIJSTMEISrTS. 

Iby the Lord's Supper ; but tlie method of giv- 
ing to God was still the same. In the first 
chapter of Acts I read that as many as had 
money ''brought it and laid it at the disciples' 
feet." Some sold their most valuable estates, 
houses and land, in order to bring money. No 
embroidering of useless purses, and crocheting 
a few senseless articles of dress, and giving a 
few groceries, and waiting on the table behind 
the chair of some world-lover and God-hater, 
and calling that an offering to the Lord. No 
presenting of some old faded pincushions or 
unsalable article of merchandise to the disci- 
ples, to be raffled or voted for. Thank God, 
such things never occurred to them ! they did 
so love Jesus Christ and his cause that they 
gave the best they had, and all they had. As 
the Bible says, they sold their lands and houses 
and laid the money at the disciples' feet. Later 
still, when the church is thoroughly organized 
and flourishing, might we not expect to see 
that method again, and recognized as a rule for 
all to go by ? Undoubtedly Paul crystallizes the 
practice in one of his epistles and formulates-it 
in words never to be forgotten. Here it is in 
the sixteenth chapter of First Corinthians and 



TWEISTTY OBJECTIOlSrS. 95 

second verse : ''Upon the first day of the week 
let every one of you lay by him in store as God 
hath prospered him." Bnt suppose God has 
not prospered you ; then he does not expect 
anything from you. But what if God has pros- 
pered one, and the man will not give ? To that 
I say, you are not empowered to force or cajole 
n man into giving — better leave him with God. 
And yet I would not have you forget that there 
is always a resource left the church. It is, in- 
deed, a resource and power. It covers the illib- 
eral man's case, and all cases. I have rarely 
known it to fail. It was tested several years 
ago in this city by a faithful layman in another 
denomination. There was a pressing burden- 
some debt of some $16,000. It had rested as an 
incubus upon them for years. One afternoon 
this gentleman requested nine or ten other 
male members of that church to meet him in a 
certain office. Here they spent a number of 
hours in humble, earnest prayer to God. As 
the prayer ascended, of course God descended ; 
and there steadily grew within them a profound 
sense of their obligation to God. He was their 
Maker, Preserver, Benefactor ; he had given 
ten thousand mercies, his Son had died for 



96 CHUECH ElSTTERTAINMEl^TS. 

them, lie had forgiven them, and this moment 
had heaven and endless life and blessedness 
av^aiting them. And nov^ v^hat was it that 
they could do for him ? What act or gift or 
sacrifice could ever repay, in the least degree, 
even a part of his love? ''Lord, what wilt 
thou have us to do ?" Who wonders at what 
followed ? — that on their melted, grateful hearts 
God poured the spirit of his love, the tender, 
beautiful grace of Christian liberality. They 
arose from their knees, and in ten minutes 
wiped out the debt of $16,000. 

The same heavenly recourse is open to us, 
and the same gracious result awaits us. Let 
any congregation, rich or poor, great or small, 
come together in prayer before God. I care^ 
not what the financial burdens may be. Let 
them ask importunately for the presence of the 
Holy Ghost. Let them recall who God is, 
what he has done, what he is doing, what he is 
going to do for them, both in this life and the 
life to come. Let them linger thus, asking for 
the grace and life and power of a consecrated 
heart ; and while they are upon their knees 
the power will come. That which just now 
seems impossible, will suddenly, strangely,. 



TWENTY OBJECTIOlSrs. 97 

sweetly and graciously become possible, the 
demand will be met, the burden lifted, the last 
dollar paid, and that, too, with a conscious 
blessedness and rejoicing within the souls of 
the givers, that comes only a little short of the 
thrill and joy and rapture of the redeemed in 
heaven. 



THE END. 



Tails to Sidaj-Sclil M\m. 

By rev. J. G. TERRILL. 

l^mo, 200 'pages, hmind in fine cloth, 75 Cents. 

This book is the result of twenty-five years of experience in 
Sunday-school, and treats of : 1. The Sunday-school Organi- 
zation and Management. 2. Methods of Work. 3. Studies 
in Human Nature. 4. Rules of Interpretation as Applied to 
the Bible. 5. Illustrative Exercises for Primary Classes and 
Children's Meetings. In the style of presentation, subject 
matter, and price of the book, the wants of the Officers and 
Teachers of the ordinary Sunday-school are kept in view. 

A very comprehensive book. — [S. S. Times.] 

A sensible manual for the average Sunday-school teacher. — 
[N. Y. Independent.] 

We have been very favorably impressed with the book, be- 
cause it is so intensely practical. The subject is systemati- 
cally treated, and leaders of teachers' meetings can not do 
better than adopt it as a text-book, and devote half an hour of 
each session to teaching the theory and practice of teaching as 
here systematized. — [Evan. Mess.] 

This is a practical and helpful book. Almost all Sunday- 
school workers could study it to advantage. — [Mich. Advocate. 

Any school that will adopt this book generally, and carry 
forward its work or doctiines here laid down, will not be long 
in developing into a model school, and reaping the harvest of 
a rich fruitage. — [Christian at Work.] 

These Talks are well attested in their profitableness and ex- 
cellence. — [Herald and Presbyter.] 

A plain, practical, common sense book on a very important 
subject. The author has had wide experience in this field of 
work. He knows thoroughly the ground over which he would 
lead others, and possesses the happy faculty of packing a great 
deal of valuable information as to matter and manner of teach- 
ing into this little hand-book. We commend it to the attention 
of all Sunday-school workers.— [Buffalo Advocate.] 

We are pleased with the plan and treatment of the subjects 
throughout, and are sure that the diligent Sunday-school 
teacher who longs for more thorough equipment, will find in 
this book a helper of great value. — [Religious Telescope.] 

The author talks from observation and experience, and talks 
well. — [Illustrated Christian Weekly.] 

Sent on receipt of price, postpaid. Address 

A. W. HALL, Publisher, 

>Syracuse, N. Y. 



WORKS 



BY 



Rev. LUTHER LEE. 



lElements of Theolo^ ; or, Ad Exposition of the Divine 
Origin, Doctrines, Morals and Institutions of Christianity. 
By Rev. Luther Lee, D.D., formerly Prof, of Theology in 
Adrian College. Eleventh Edition. Octavo, double-col- 
umn, 584 pp., cloth, red edges, net, $3.00. Sheep, $2.50. 

As an oral debater upon theological subjects, we believe 
that he never had his equal in our denomination, and doubt 
if he ever had his superior in the world. His arguments, 
with comparatively few modifications, remain as the most 
condensed, pertinent, incisive and convincing defense of the 
truths of the evangelical system. — [N. Y. Advocate.] 

Immortality of tlie Soul. 12mo, 183 pp., cloth, 50 cts. 

In this little volume can be found all the essential features 
of this momentous subject. It is the most compact and 
conclusive work on this topic that has come under our ob- 
servation. — [Christian Herald.] 

-Natural Theology; or. The Existence, Attributes and 
Government of God, including the obligations and duties 
of men, demonstrated by arguments drawn from the phe- 
nomena of Nature. 12mo, 193 pp. 75 cts. 

This work is recognized as possessing rare merit. For all 
who desire a concise, conclusive argument against atheism 
and modern agnosticism, this little volume will be of special 
value. — [Keligious Telescope.] 

Sent on receipt of price, postpaid. Address, 

A. W. HALL, Publisher, 
Syracuse, X. Y. 



1? 82 








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